


The Horse Was Lost

by skulls_and_stripes



Category: BoJack Horseman
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Car Accidents, Depression, Drug Abuse, Drug Use, Homophobia, LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Abuse, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-05
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:07:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 70,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22569859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skulls_and_stripes/pseuds/skulls_and_stripes
Summary: For want of a nail, the shoe was lost. For want of a shoe, the horse was lost. For want of a horse, the message was lost, and for want of a message, the battle was lost. And so the people mourned the lost nail and worshipped it as their potential saviour, if only it had been there. Nobody wants to think about the fact that maybe the horse just wasn't fast enough to take the message anyway.Or: The one where BoJack sticks by Herb's side and they start dating, but will that really make a difference?
Relationships: BoJack Horseman/Herb Kazzaz
Comments: 227
Kudos: 189
Collections: Ollywoo AUs





	1. Back In The 90s

The atmosphere remains thick with tension. The two take turns opening their mouths, then closing them before saying anything, then gesturing vaguely while having some strange idea that the other can tell what they’re trying to say when even they themselves aren’t sure. You could cut the tension in here with a knife, and BoJack very nearly did so this morning, if one takes ‘cutting the tension in here with a knife’ to mean ‘accidentally stabbing yourself in an attempt at making a sandwich because you just found out your coworker (and friend?) is in trouble for public indecency and you were distracted’.

“BoJack, I gotta tell you.” The horse looks up, preparing himself to act surprised, for the sake of politeness. “I’m gay."

“No doy.” Perhaps not his best effort at acting surprised.

Herb, luckily, elects to ignore this comment. “I know we haven’t been close for the past couple years.”

BoJack opens his mouth, then closes it, then opens it again. “Okay, I’m gonna hold back my ‘No doy’s because there might be a lot.”

“But you know me, right?” continues Herb. There’s a pleading edge to his voice, but not in a pitiful way, just appealing to whatever good still hasn’t leaked out of his friend. “You know that I’m a good guy. They’re gunning for me at the network, and if I get kicked off this, I won’t recover. I need to know that you’ve got my back. If you threaten to walk, they’ll listen to you.”

BoJack thinks it over.

“How do you know they’ll listen?” he asks, cautiously. Testing the waters.

“Well, they can’t exactly let you walk, can they? You’re the horse. Without you, it would just be … ‘Around’.”

“Honestly, that sounds like exactly the sort of stupid bullshit Angela would do.” He can see it now -- three precocious orphans inexplicably living without adult supervision, learning that they don’t need parents, actually, because wisdom and whatever is all  _ around.  _ “Couldn’t they just get another horse actor? Just anyone with brown fur and they’ll paint on the diamond, it’s not like kids can tell the difference.”

Herb grimaces. It’s clear that some part of him was hoping that BoJack wouldn’t think to ask that question. “They probably wouldn’t be able to just  _ replace  _ you. You’re not just some horse, you’re the star of the show.”

“Yes, but if they  _ can  _ replace me…”

There’s a long, ominous silence. “That might be a risk we have to take.”

BoJack grimaces apologetically, lying back on the couch. “I’m going to be honest with you, this is a big ask.”

For just a second, Herb’s face falls. But just as quickly he’s regained his usual charisma in an attempt to win him over. “I know, and I’m so sorry to put you on the spot like this. But if there’s one person that they need to keep the show going, it’s you. You’re the only one who has a chance to help me.”

BoJack weighs up his options.

He can risk losing everything he's worked so hard for -- his entire career, and right before a potential opportunity at his dream role in Secretariat. Or he can risk losing something that he doesn't really have yet -- but it's  _ there,  _ and it's been there since the kiss at Griffith Park, and if he doesn't take the opportunity now then it may close forever.

“Herb…” he begins. “You know that joke in the last episode we worked on, where the horse tells Sabrina he didn't get her a piece of cake, and then when she gets sad he tells her that he actually got her the whole cake?”

“What?”

BoJack sighs. “Herb, I'm not willing to risk getting fired just because my friend is gay.”

Herb’s face falls. He turns away from BoJack, betrayed. BoJack takes advantage of the fact that he's not looking to place a hand over his.

“But I'd definitely be willing to risk getting fired just because my boyfriend is gay.”

He can practically see the moment when it clicks -- Herb looks up, confused at first, but after a second his eyes widen and a blush takes over his face. There’s a fleeting moment of eye contact, and then the two turn away, embarrassed.

“I feel like I should probably mention that I was just trying to say I would help you and ask you out at the same time,” mumbles BoJack, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. “Like, I’m not trying to blackmail you into dating me.”

“Are you serious?” mumbles Herb quietly, glancing at BoJack and then back at the ground. “Or is this some sort of weird prank?”

“You think I’m gonna risk getting fired for a prank?” His usual sardonic tone has returned, but it’s out of place, not quite delicate enough for the situation. 

Herb gives a nervous chuckle, still avoiding eye contact. “I’ve been in love with you for …  _ years,  _ BoJack.”

“Okay, I know I said I was holding back my ‘no doy’s, but… No doy.”

“Was it really that obvious?”

“Well, yeah, I mean, there were signs. I noticed them because I’m a  _ detective _ . See, there’s the way you make eye contact with me slightly more than other people --” he starts listing off his points on his fingers -- “the way you kept giving me your jackets when it was cold, and oh yeah, you kept  _ kissing me.” _

“That was a bit of a giveaway, wasn’t it?”

“Okay, I change my mind, I’m not holding back my ‘no doy’s anymore.”

Herb finally manages to make eye contact again. “Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

“I don’t know. We grew apart. I’m not exactly good at being vulnerable.”

“Well… at least I know now.” He takes BoJack’s hand in his own, blushing furiously. “So we're together.”

“Yep.”

“And you're not letting me get fired, even if it risks your own career.”

“No matter what she says, I've got your back. I swear on my uncle’s grave.”

Herb’s eyes widen. “Shit, your uncle’s dead?”

“Eh, he died in World War II. So, like, it’s not like I knew him.”

Herb puts a hand on his back. “Well, even if you didn’t know him, I’m sorry.”

“You’re forgiven,” snarks BoJack. There’s a short silence between the two. 

“So, uh…” mumbles Herb, back to avoiding eye contact and rubbing the back of his neck nervously. “First date?”

“We can’t exactly go around acting all lovey-dovey in public,” mutters BoJack. “The network will be more likely to just let us both go if they know I like men too. It’s best if we act like I’m just threatening to walk because you’re my friend.”

“We’d better hope that works,” half-sighs Herb. His eyes light up. “Although, you might need some persuading to risk your own career for me. Maybe I’d need to offer you some incentives.”

The point of this proposition flies high into the air, right over BoJack’s head. “We already agreed.”

“No, I mean, we might need to meet up outside of work to talk about it, come to a decision. We might have to go to dinner to discuss this.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Oh.”

“Or at least, that’s what we say if anyone sees us ‘carpooling’ together. I know a place where nobody will tell anyone we’re there.”

“You sure?” asks BoJack nervously. “I mean, everyone already knows you’re gay. That makes it kinda dangerous. If we’re just a  _ little  _ bit too friendly with each other…”

Herb leans in a little closer. “Well, that’s a risk we’re gonna have to take.”


	2. A Series of Gay Vignettes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day-to-day life of Herb and BoJack through the years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> broke: having the year the chapter takes place in be in the title of the chapter, or at the front of the chapter in bold so the readers don't miss it  
> woke: having the characters find increasingly obviously forced reasons to say stupid bullshit like "this newspaper from 2000 -- the year which it currently is"

BoJack opens his mouth, then closes it. He struggles to think of what he could possibly say. His eyebrow remains raised. He feels like he's experiencing the rough emotional equivalent to when you're on a road trip, and you're actually kind of trying to get somewhere important, but there's a guy in the middle of the road doing an impression of a horse using a hammer to make a sandwich.

In Herb’s defence, it is a remarkably good impression of a horse using a hammer to make a sandwich, considering that he’s not a horse, he’s not making a sandwich, and he doesn’t have a hammer.

“It's so unfair that I'm being  _ forced  _ to  _ cobble together  _ this sandwich,” he yells, in as serious a tone it is possible to yell such a thing in. “when I  _ could  _ be writing my  _ revolutionary  _ novel!”

“Pretty good impression considering you’ve never met the asshole,” chuckles BoJack. 

Herb switches back to his normal voice. “You don’t  _ cobble together  _ a sandwich, you just  _ make  _ the damn thing.”

“Honestly, I think that was the first time he had to actually make his own goddamn sandwich.” He clears his throat. “Anyway, then he starts talking about how he had a good run on his bullshit novel, and I swear to God, he’s just talking and talking forever about the stupid-ass book. And I’m just sitting there in the car, wondering what crime I’ve committed to deserve such a long sentence --” Herb laughs politely and he continues -- “when all of a sudden he tells me that as he was writing, he thought about how good it was, and then realised that it was only good because _ I  _ wasn’t there to ruin it, and that’s how he remembered Mom hadn’t picked me up.”

Herb doesn’t laugh politely.

He instead stands there, frowning. “That’s … not really funny.”

“Eh, anything’s funny if you laugh at it.” Just as Herb opens his mouth to protest, he continues. “And then he starts talking about how he’s  _ doing my mother’s job  _ \-- of  _ picking me up --  _ and that I shouldn’t let that give me ‘mixed up ideas about gender’. And how it’s not his fault if I grow up to become ‘a queer’.” He pauses briefly. “I wonder if it is his fault, heh.”

“You…” begins Herb, but the sentence dissolves in his mouth. There’s rather a lot to unpack here, and any rational person would just throw out the entire suitcase, but Herb presses on. “You think that you like men because your dad picked you up once?”

“Actually, he did it, like, four separate times in my whole life. So yeah, then he goes on about how women can’t be trusted, and then he obnoxiously sticks his head in my face and --”

“No, hang on, back up,” insists Herb, holding up his hands to signal him to stop. “He only remembered that you needed picked up because you weren’t there to ruin his day? And he said it  _ to your face?!” _

“Jeez, Herb, calm down. I’m trying to tell a story here.”

Herb opens his mouth, then gives up.

* * *

“Running out of mustard? Divorce. Feeling a little sad? Divorce --”

“Come  _ on,  _ mom, nobody ever gets divorced over mustard. You know that. You and dad should just --”

Beatrice opens her mouth to argue, but Herb steps between the two, hoping that at least one of them will have the decency to not fight in front of him. “It’s  _ great  _ to see you, Beatrice.” he lies.

“Of course it is. Must be nice to see anything  _ real  _ when you’re wasting your life on those silly stories for your TV show.” She scoffs. “I made  _ so many  _ sacrifices for BoJack, and this is all he’s doing.”

BoJack opens his mouth to protest, but Herb once again steps in. “Well, actually, we’re just doing the last few episodes of  _ Horsin’ Around  _ at the moment. As of 1999 -- the year which it currently is -- the show’s been going for twelve seasons, thanks to the work of a great writer. It was fun, but we’ve decided it’s run its course.”

Beatrice sighs. “Anyway, I came to see if you wanted this painting.” She holds up the large painting in her hands. “It belonged to your grandfather.”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll take it,” answers BoJack, after Herb gives him a look that clearly communicates that this visit is to be finished as soon as possible.

“Of course,” Beatrice mutters as Herb takes the painting off her and starts dragging it to lean against the wall. “All you do is take.” She glares at Herb and adds, “Still trying to do this  _ gay  _ thing, are you?”

“Yes, Mom,” answers BoJack, not even trying to keep the annoyance out of his voice.

She scoffs. “And yet you tell me I should divorce Butterscotch.” She turns to leave. “Now that you have Joseph’s painting, you ought to be making an effort to live up to his legacy. He was a man who knew what marriage was.”

As she begins to walk off, BoJack calls after her.

“Didn’t he lobotomize grandma?!?!”

* * *

“I’m telling you, this foal looks just like you.”

BoJack, however reluctantly, looks up from the TV screen and pauses the episode of  _ Horsin’ Around.  _ “Who looks like me?”

“The girl in this newspaper,” answers Herb, showing the paper to BoJack. “This newspaper from 2000 -- the year which it currently is -- has this story about a horse girl that was adopted by eight gay men.” 

“Seriously?” He picks up the newspaper and reads the column. “Geez, it sucks that gay people can adopt now.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “You do realise that we’re … ?”

“Of course I know we’re gay,” snaps BoJack. “It’s just such bullshit. Remember when I had to threaten to quit the show so they wouldn’t fire you? It’s not fair that gay people today have it so good.” Before Herb can argue, he adds, “Besides, I don’t see the resemblance.”

“She’s got a diamond just like yours.”

“So? Plenty of horses have diamonds.” He squints at the page. “And her last name is totally bullshit. Why do we have to use all of the father’s surnames? Can’t you at least only have one Manheim?”

“One of the Manheims has two Ns and the other only has one.”

“Ugh, whatever.” He un-pauses  _ Horsin’ Around.  _ Herb sighs, but says nothing.

* * *

He’s used to waking up on his couch on the first day of November, so it’s a pleasant surprise when he finds himself in his own bed.

He stumbles out of bed and down to the living room. Herb is already up. This is normal for the first day of November, because the first day of November is when BoJack sleeps in to an insane degree. There’s also some other guy, a young-looking stranger on the couch wearing a red hoodie and a yellow beanie, but that’s probably just some guest of Herb’s or something.

“BJ!” Herb greets him with a smile, as always. “I was hoping you’d be up soon. This is Todd.” He gestures to the stranger. “Yesterday when all the guests were leaving, after the end of your annual Halloween party for 2009 -- the year which it currently is -- Todd told me that he didn’t really have anywhere else to go, so I said he could sleep on the couch for tonight.” He gives BoJack a pleading look. “Can he stay here until he can find somewhere else to stay?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. Is there breakfast?”

“Sorry, I didn’t make anything. I haven’t really been hungry lately.”

“It’s fine, I’ll order something.” He checks his pockets, then frowns. “Have you seen my phone?”

“Oh yeah, I left it on the counter after you dropped it last night when you were drunk.” He picks up the phone. “It rang a few times during the night, but I didn’t want to answer in case it was Beatrice.”

BoJack shudders slightly. Memories of the previous night come flashing back. “Thanks, by the way.” he mumbles quietly. “You know, for telling me I didn’t have to answer.”

“She abused you,” says Herb as he hands him the phone. “You don’t owe her anything.”

BoJack turns the phone on. “God dammit, she sent me a text message. Heh, I thought she’d be too old for that.” He taps the screen a few times so he can view the message, and his face falls.

“What?” asks Herb anxiously.

“Shit, my dad’s dead.”

There’s a long, heavy silence.

“Probably because of that time Bea forced him to  _ cobble together  _ a sandwich,” snarks Herb, and BoJack can’t help but laugh.”

* * *

An artificial  _ neigh  _ echoes throughout the room, and BoJack is quick to rise to his feet and get the door. He stands face to face with his ‘roommate’ -- he prefers to think of Todd as a guest or a freeloader, since he doesn’t pay rent, and it also feels weird to call anyone a roommate when that was the excuse he used for living with Herb while he was closeted -- and takes a large shopping bag out of Todd’s hands. “Thanks.”

The three of them living together have managed to devise some sort of system -- Todd takes BoJack’s credit card and goes shopping, and gets whatever the hell he wants as long as all the items on BoJack’s list are obtained. Usually he just gets some extra food for himself, although he is known to sometimes come home with a bizarre assortment of materials for whatever whacky scheme he’s gotten himself into this time. Either way, BoJack’s years as a famous actor have left his bank account full and Herb’s equally well-off from his years as the writer of the sitcom, so no amount of ridiculous hijinks are likely to cause financial problems for any of them.

“No problem,” answers Todd. He takes his own purchases out of the bag and lies them against a wall with a large blue  _ 4  _ painted on it -- the walls were numbered as part of his latest whacky scheme. “Where’s Herb?”

“In the bathroom, he’ll be out here in a minute.”

“Aww, man!” protests Todd. His face falls. “I was hoping he would say something like, ‘2012 -- the year which it currently is’.”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “Why would you hope for him to specifically say that?”

Todd leans against the fourth wall. “I dunno. Hey, is it just me, or has he been losing weight?”

The horse frowns. “I have noticed that,” he mutters. “I can’t see why, though, in fact I think he’s been exercising less than usual.” He raises an eyebrow at Todd, who’s still leaning on the fourth wall. “Remind me again why you numbered the walls?”

“I’m glad you asked!” answers Todd. Whenever Todd says, “I’m glad you asked!”, BoJack internally replies with a, “Well,  _ someone  _ has to be glad.” The person who asks is very rarely glad once the answer starts.

“Okay, so when I was in high school I had this friend named Storm, and storm had a half-brother called Thowra--”

“God, that’s a stupid-ass name.”

“He was Australian.”

“Australians still speak English, though.”

“Yeah, well, anyway, his name was Thowra and his whole thing was that he had super pale fur, so he would, like, blend into the snow and shit. And we were in the same PE class, but he would always beat me in races because I would get distracted trying to figure out where he was.” 

“...And this relates to the giant numbers you’ve painted on my walls because … ?”

“Uh, Storm messaged me last week saying he wanted to get back in touch. So I thought I should be prepared in case Thowra wanted to race.”

“...In my house?”

“Yeah! See, he won’t be able to blend in as well because part of the wall is blue.”

“And they’re number because … ?”

“Well, how else would I explain why only part of the wall is blue?”

If one were to take their brain out of their body and lay all of its blood vessels end-to-end, the resulting chain would last halfway to the moon. This, however, still isn’t long enough for BoJack to be able to wrap his head around the scheme. He’s still trying to figure it out when Herb returns. 

“Hey, BJ, I -- Oh, Todd, you’re back.”

“Yep!” says Todd proudly. “I was just explaining to BoJack why I numbered the walls.”

“That’s nice.” There’s an uncomfortably long silence, and the smile across Herb’s face seems somehow forced. “Hey, uh…” He forces a chuckle. “Not to be killing the moment,” he mumbles, in a tone that very clearly indicates that he’s about to kill the moment. “But, uh, you need to go see a doctor if you’re shitting blood, right?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact! todd's friends from high school (Storm and his half-brother Thowra) are based on characters of the same name from a book series called The Silver Brumby. I had that book series as a special interest when I was younger and once I got into bojack horseman I started having this weird idea that the brumbies (a brumby is an Australian wild horse for those who don't know) were bojacks weird Australian cousins or something.
> 
> less fun fact! unexplained weight loss and blood in feces are symptoms of rectal cancer!


	3. The Misanthrope

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herb gets diagnosed with rectal cancer.

The car ride home is uncomfortably silent.

BoJack keeps his shaking hands on the steering wheel, barely able to concentrate on the road ahead of him. A part of him wants to just pull over now and catch his breath, but then Herb would ask him why he’s stopping, and he’d have to address the elephant in the room. Besides, he doubts that any amount of resting could slow his racing heart at this point. So he keeps driving.

Herb is the one to finally break the silence. “BJ…”

“Not now.” There’s a pleading edge to his voice, and he can feel his voice breaking like he’s going to cry, but he knows he can’t cry, not in front of Herb. “Not while I’m driving. I feel like I’m going to freak out and crash.”

“Do you want me to drive?”

“No, I can get us home okay, just … We’ll talk about it at home. That way we won’t have to repeat it all to explain to Todd.”

“Okay, if you’re sure.”

The rest of the drive is silent.

* * *

Todd can see the tension in the air from the moment the door opens. Herb and BoJack walk inside without a word and sit down on the couch. The two remain silent for a long time, and Todd is the first to ask the obvious question. 

“How was the appointment?”

From the way they wince and recoil, you would think his words had caused them physical pain. For a long time nobody answers the question, but Herb finally manages to give a response.

“Cancer.”

“Shit, seriously?” exclaims Todd. When their silence confirms it, he quickly adds, “But it’s gonna be okay, right?” They remain silent. “Like, you’ll get chemotherapy, and then it’ll be okay?”

There’s a long, ominous pause.

“Maybe.”

BoJack lies back against the couch, resting his neck uncomfortably on the armrest. “You can’t die. You _can’t.”_

“Thanks, you’ve cured my cancer,” snarks Herb, and it doesn’t lighten the atmosphere half as much as he hoped it would.

“Don’t joke about it!” snaps BoJack. “You’re _dying._ You’re …” His sentence trails off and dissolves in his mouth. “Shit. I need a drink.”

He sits up, ready to get up and get a drink, but Herb places a hand on his knee. “Look, BJ, it’s possible that chemotherapy will save me, and it’s also possible that it won’t. For now, all we can do is hope for the best and make the most of the time I definitely have left.”

BoJack lets out a few shaky breaths. “Okay. Just … We’ll focus on that tomorrow. I need a drink. Just one drink.”

* * *

It’s more than one drink.

What starts as a drink in the evenings to numb the pain of knowing that his husband is dying quickly becomes a near-constant state of being just a _little_ tipsy -- rarely actually _drunk,_ not with his rapidly rising alcohol tolerance, but never quite sober, either. Days at a time fly past through a drunken lens, wasted on reruns of _Horsin’ Around._ BoJack wastes away, and there’s nothing Herb can do to stop it.

How could he stop the drinking, when he can’t stop the motivation? He can’t stop the chemotherapy from making him feel weak and sick. He can’t stop the way his clothes grow too large for him as he struggles to keep up with the rapid weight loss. And he can’t stop the scarily high chance that the treatment won’t be enough and he’ll still die. Herb wastes away, and there’s nothing BoJack can do to stop it.

But there is an understanding that they’re wasting away together, and no amount of high tempers motivated by stress and alcohol is able to take that away.

* * *

He inhales sharply. “It’s…” God, he hates lying, but what is he meant to do, tell his dying husband that he’s a shitty author? “It’s good.”

“You really think so?” asks Herb, adjusting his oversized jacket and shivering slightly against the cold.

“...Yeah,” lies BoJack, who up until very recently thought his father was the worst writer in the world.

When Herb’s eyes light up, he knows he was right not to tell the truth. “It’s not finished yet, of course,” he explains, shutting down his laptop. “I just want to make sure I’m remembered for something. You’ll make sure this gets published after I die, right?”

BoJack gulps. “Of course I’ll publish it if you die.”

Herb frowns, but chooses not to address the matter. “What about your book? Started it yet?”

BoJack avoids eye contact. “Still deciding what font to use.”

Herb sighs. “BJ, as of 2014 -- the year which it currently is -- you’ve been claiming to have been working on that autobiography for ages. Why don’t you just hire a ghostwriter?”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “Why do you keep saying stuff like that?”

“Stuff like what?”

“Stuff like ‘2014 -- the year which it currently is’.”

“I haven’t said anything like that since 2009.”

“Why are you keeping track of -- oh, forget it.” He sighs. “I’ll hire a ghostwriter, but Herb?”

“Yeah?”

“You have to be alive long enough to read it.”

Herb says nothing.

* * *

The car ride home is even more silent than usual.

“What’s eating you?”

“Oh, just the weather’s a little humid,” deadpans BoJack through gritted teeth. “I’m driving my husband home from chemotherapy, isn’t that enough reason to be upset?”

“Of course that’s enough reason,” answers Herb, glancing out the window. “I just feel like there’s something else.”

“What are you talking about?!” yells BoJack defensively, gesturing wildly and then promptly putting his hands back onto the steering wheel in fear. “Everything is fine, and I’m not being eaten by my own guilt, and I certainly didn’t sabotage Todd’s rock opera.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Todd has a rock opera?”

“Had.” There’s a short silence, but eventually the horse relents and sighs. “While you were getting … _treated_.. Todd has this whole ridiculous thing where he was creating a rock opera.”

“And you sabotaged it?”

“I never said that!”

“Well, you were certainly thinking it very loudly.”

BoJack sighs. “He was going to move out and I, I don’t know, I panicked. I didn’t want to be alone, after you … you know?”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“Obviously, I’m not happy about that.”

“Neither am I, really.”

“Don’t try to make yourself the victim here. Todd really admires you and you should appreciate him more.” He sighs. “I think you should tell him the truth about the rock opera.”

BoJack gulps. “Yeah. I’ll do that once we’re home.”

“Oh, and BJ?” His voice loses the terse edge of telling his husband off, replaced by a softness.

“...Yeah?”

He places a hand on BoJack’s knee. “Everything’s gonna be okay.”

BoJack’s eyes light up. “So you’re going to survive?” he asks, practically begging for the answer to be yes. “You’ll finish treatment and then everything will be okay?”

“...”

“...”

“...I promise, everything’s going to be okay.”


	4. Chekhov's Gun

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack tries to write his autobiography, with the help of drugs.

“Now, believe me,” he assures her. “I spend a lot of time with the real me, and nobody’s gonna love that guy.” 

“...Okay.” Princess Carolyn concedes defeat, which isn’t something she does often.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go take a shower so I can’t tell if I’m crying or not.”

He hangs up before she can protest, but as he turns to head to the shower, he’s stopped by a hand on his shoulder.

His grip isn’t strong and he fails to pull him back, but the lack of force behind the hand is enough to stop BoJack dead in his tracks. “What’s up?”

“Diane called.” It comes out as more of a sigh than a sentence. “Apparently you had a fight with her and you’re writing your own book. By the end of the week.”

“Yep!” says BoJack proudly.

“Didn’t you spend two years trying to decide what font to use?”

“...Yes, but this time will be different!” His voice is full of determination. “I’m going to just start writing now, and I won’t stop until I’m finished!”

Herb remains silent for a long time.

“I’d say that I bet my ass you won’t, but I don’t think anyone would take me up on that bet.”

“Pfft, you’ll see,” insists the horse. “I promise you, by three PM today, I’ll have at least half a novel. I’m going to start right now!”

He pauses.

“Just as soon as I take a shower.”

* * *

Six hours later, it’s three PM, and BoJack has almost come close to nearly deciding what font to use.

But, of course, it’s not because he’s a chronic procrastinator, or because he’s just not a good writer. It’s just that he needs something to help him focus. Like coffee, wait, never mind, coffee isn’t helping. Cigarettes don’t work either. Tequila fails to capture his attention. At last he decides he just needs to motivate himself by listening to the right music.

To do drugs to.

* * *

Herb pinches the bridge of his nose. “Sarah Lynn, I know things got kind of out of hand last time when we tried to make you stop doing drugs. So I just want to ask why you came here … to give BoJack drugs.”

His exasperation is lost on the young pop star. “Well, you can’t go wrong with Doctor Hu’s drugs.” She gestures into the air. “They’re from another dimension.”

BoJack hesitates. “There are gonna help me focus, and get work done, right?”

“Yes,” answers Doctor Hu, who apparently is still a legitimate doctor. “These are what I give college students so when they come to, their term papers have written themselves.”

“That’s exactly what he needs!” says Todd. “Also, I should probably do another one.” He snorts another line of whatever madness he’s been given, and turns to Herb. “Want some?”

Herb shakes his head in exasperation. “Between the cancer and the chemotherapy, my body can’t handle any more strain.”

Todd’s eyes light up. “So you can be the designated driver!”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Where are we meant to be driving?”

“Nowhere,” answers Sarah Lynn irritably. “We’re staying here so we can write BoJack’s stupid-ass book.”

“Duh,” says Todd, almost annoyed. “I meant the  _ emotional  _ designated driver.”

“What?”

“You heard me,” scoffs Todd. “Why would we have a designated driver anyway? Normally BoJack just drives drunk and almost kills us.”

“Yeah, except I can’t do that anymore, since Herb’s car has dodgy brakes and I gotta be super careful.” He turns to Sarah Lynn. “Thanks for coming down to Ollywoo to help.”

“No problem.” She pauses. “Ollywoo?”

“What, have you been too high to watch the news?”

“Uh, yeah, pretty much.” 

He sighs. “Long story short, I got drunk and stole the  _ H  _ from the Hollywood sign for Herb, my friend Mr. Peanutbutter copied my idea and took the  _ D  _ for his girlfriend Diane, and they both got destroyed." He turns to the doctor. “How long ‘till these drugs kick in?”

* * *

Their fingers clack on the keyboards at full speed, echoing throughout the room. Three pairs of bloodshot eyes stare at the screen. They type away, like an infinite amount of monkeys banging on a typewriter, ready to write Shakespeare. Herb paces around them with his walker, glancing at their screens and sighing, like a human staring at an infinite amount of monkeys banging on typewriters and realising that while maybe one or two of them has written Shakespeare, most of them have just keysmashed a lot and written some erotic  _ Doctor Who  _ fanfiction.

“Okay, Todd, how’s it going with the heartwarming anecdotes?”

“Great!” answers Todd. “I’m writing about the time we officially became best friends.” Herb looks over the boy’s shoulder, hoping to see a recount of the Halloween party from 2009, and instead sees a soup recipe. 

“Nice!” says BoJack approvingly. “Can you change ‘best’ to ‘pretty good’?” Todd’s face falls. “Sarah Lynn, how’s it coming with the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ years?”

“Almost done with the story where Hulk Hogan guest starred and told us to say no to drugs,” answers Sarah Lynn, seemingly unaware of the fact that she is in fact writing a theory on how 9/11 happened. 

BoJack opens his mouth to reply, then closes it. A second later his eyes widen and he points a finger accusingly at Herb. “Nobody wants your ass because it has cancer!”

“What?”

“Ew,” sneers Sarah Lynn. “Some of us are eating.”

“You’re visibly not eating,” says Herb, exasperated, before turning back to BoJack. “So did you only just find out about the cancer?”

“No, I --” The horse rushes to defend himself. “Because you said you’d bet your ass, but nobody would take you up on the bet?”

“...That was seven hours ago.”

“...Oh.” He continues typing. “Well, maybe in another four hours I’ll get another joke.”

* * *

Four hours later, Sarah Lynn and Todd hit send on their sections and BoJack edits it together to form an autobiography that he describes as “surprisingly literate and insightful, but still fun” and Herb describes as “several pages of erotic  _ Doctor Who  _ fanfiction, a soup recipe, five different 9/11 conspriacy theories, and several embedded YouTube videos”.

One problem: They don’t know how to end the story.

“I like your idea better, BoJack” says Todd.

“What?” says BoJack, not entirely sure which one is Todd and which is Sarah Lynn.

“About how you and Herb end up in Malibu together. I like the part where you go on road trips in your spare time.”

BoJack’s eyes light up. “Yeah, right,” he says, an idea taking hold. “And one day Herb dies but I’m left here without him. So after the funeral, I get really drunk to cope, and go for one last road trip. But the brakes give out, and I’m too drunk to do anything, so I just let myself crash into a tree. And I have nobody left to wonder where I am, so nobody calls an ambulance until it’s too late.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“Yeesh, talk about Chekhov’s Gun,” says Todd. “Your car’s dodgy brakes only get mentioned, like, once in the whole book.”

“And you really think we’re not going to have the brakes fixed by the time I die?” asks Herb.

Sarah Lynn suddenly gasps aloud and stands up. “That’s it!”

“What’s it?”

She points at Herb. “You need to kill him!”

“...What?”

“I'm serious,” she insists. “BoJack’s entire thing is that he's going to be totally screwed when Herb dies and he's left alone! If Herb ended up outliving him, because of an accident that was his fault? The readers would eat that shit up!”

“I'm  _ not  _ killing BoJack,” says Herb firmly.

“Yeah, he wouldn't kill me,” agrees BoJack. “Although if he wanted to, I do have this convenient gun.” He takes a gun out of his pocket, prompting three gasps of fear, and quickly tries to reassure them by waving it around unsafely. “Relax! I have this gun to  _ protect  _ us.”

Herb gulps. “Is that your gun-shaped lighter or your lighter-shaped gun?”

“Heh, you got me, it's the lighter.” To demonstrate, he attempts to light a cigarette and instead destroys a cigarette and shoots a hole in the roof. “Shit, I guess it's the gun.” He tosses it to the ground in a blatant violation of gun safety laws. “Damn, where's my lighter?”

Herb hurries to pick up the gun and put it somewhere safe. When he hears Todd’s declaration of, “Ha, now I have a gun and you you don't!”, his blood runs cold and he turns, but Todd is merely holding a broom.

“Yeah,” counters BoJack, picking up a different broom. “Well I have a gun too!” He blinks. “Todd, are you holding a gun or a broom?”

“A broom. You're both holding brooms.” Herb sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation.

“I don't know,” answers Todd, seemingly deaf to Herb’s answer, and yelling as though BoJack is far away. “I guess we'll just have to shoot each other at the same time to find out.”

The two point their brooms at each other, preparing to fire, while Sarah Lynn cheers unhelpfully and Herb struggles to wrap his head around the entire situation. After a few moments, BoJack points his broom back at the ground, and goes to put his hands on Todd’s shoulders.

“Todd--”

“Shh,” insists Todd.

“Can I just say, Todd, Todd, I need you to --”

“Shh.”

“Listen, listen, Todd. Okay, just to be totally clear, we’re shooting each other to determine whether we’re holding guns or brooms, right?” God, that’s not a sentence Herb was expecting to hear before he died. “Not because you’re still upset about the whole me sabotaging you with the rock opera and suchety-such?”

“BoJack, shh, shh, okay, Bo? Quiet, quiet, quiet, quiet.” He pushes BoJack’s hands away. “As you know, I was hurt, but then I realised that’s just how you are. You know, and maybe I just need to stop expecting you to be a good person, so that way, I won’t get hurt when you’re not.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“O-Okay.”

At that moment, Sarah Lynn chimes in with a completely incomprehensible solution to America’s gun problem, and the rock opera is forgotten.

* * *

He wakes up, two days later, with Diane standing over him.

“What are you doing here?” 

“Herb called,” she explains, kneeling next to him. “He said you were really upset about how I portrayed you in my book, so I wanted to apologise.”

“To … apologise?”

“Yeah. Your autobiography is meant to be about you. You should be okay with how you're represented.” She smiles. “We should work on a new autobiography, together.” Her eye expands out of its socket and pops like a balloon. “Oh no, it's happening again.”

“What?” asks BoJack, scooting back in fear as Diane’s flesh expands rapidly, stretching out and decomposing.

“I ate too many pancakes…”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Oh shit, I'm still tripping.”

He stands up and runs out of the room. He sees Herb, sitting on the couch, wearing clothes that aren’t several sizes too large and with a head full of hair. “Herb! You’re okay!”

He envelopes his husband in a tight hug, but he feels the pointy collar bones poking his own skin. Herb gives a hollow chuckle. “They’re trying their best, but it might just be too little, too late.”

“Huh?” gasps BoJack, releasing his grip. He steps back, and watches in horror as a pile of bones collapses in his arms, with a skull falling onto the couch. He backs away, then breaks into another run.

He gallops through a room that seems to be some sort of restaurant, but every table is occupied by several familiar dogs, each repeating a statement of his own identity. “I’m Mr. Peanutbutter, I’m Mr. Peanutbutter, I’m Mr. Peanutbutter.” He keeps running until he finds his way outside, and he clambers into his own car. He slams his foot onto the pedal, and the car lurches forward, but it refuses to stop when he hits breaks, and he flails his arms uselessly in an attempt to stop it.

And then, he’s watching himself.

It’s a TV show, about a road trip. He stares at himself on the screen, yelling in fear. “Shouldn’t we help him?”

“No,” answers Diane. “He likes driving.”

He blinks, and when he opens his eyes, he’s filming an episode of  _ Horsin’ Around.  _ Everyone’s laughing. Everyone’s laughing at  _ him.  _ His breathing quickens. “Why is everyone laughing? What’s so funny?”

“Cut!” The Herb that glares at him is a larger one, with hair thinning but still clearly there. And he’s pissed. This is the 90s, before he helped Herb, before they started dating. God, they  _ hated  _ each other then. But, everything’s fine now.

“Get your head out of your ass, BJ! Your line is, ‘Too little, too late’.”

“Too little, too late.” repeats BoJack fearfully.

“You can say that again,  _ old man!”  _ sneers Ethan? Bradley? Ethan? Bradley? He shakes his head, trying to make sense of it, as his heart races and his breathing speeds up. 

Sabrina pulls on his mane. “Horse, horse, horse!”

“What is it?” he asks irritably.

She smiles at him with childish innocence. “Will you make me a penis butter and va-jelly sandwich?”

He shakes his head in confusion. “What?”

An adult Sarah Lynn stands over him and he finds himself lying on the floor. “I said, make me a penis butter and va-jelly sandwich!”

“No, no,” he insists, shaking his head.

“No?” He looks up. It’s Herb again, emaciated and frail. “Well, isn’t that too little, too late, BoJack? You let us grow apart and then tried to fix it all at once by helping me with the job.”

“I’m sinking,” he gasps, trying to get up, but the floor feels like goo, and he falls into it like it’s quicksand. “Somebody help. The floor is tar!”

“Why don’t we get out of here?” asks Herb. “Away from all the stress of Ollywoo. We can move to Malibu together.”

“I can’t,” he pants. “I’m stuck.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Do they have Pinkberry in Malibu?” He shakes his head. “I can’t!”

“Go out there.”

He cowers under the table like the foal that he is, shuddering at his mother’s glare. “I can’t.”

“Can’t lives on a house on Won’t Street,” scolds Beatrice. “You will not embarrass me in front of the entire Supper Club. I told them you were going to sing the Lollipop Song.”

“But I don’t feel like singing,” protests BoJack weakly. 

“Nobody gives a damn what you feel! You’ve got an audience out there, and they want to hear you sing. Now, you want your mommy to love you? Then you get out there and do the only thing you’re good for, which is singing the goddamn Lollipop Song. And let me tell you something: The secret to living forever is --”

Her cigarette smoke consumes his vision, and when he opens his eyes, he’s staring at her gravestone. Next to it is his father’s, and on the other side is Herb’s. Next to Herb’s is his own, with large letters under his name saying  _ WHOM NO ONE REMEMBERS _ . His breathing quickens. 

“Hey, what seems to be the problem?”

He turns. It’s Diane, standing behind a childish wooden booth with writing offering him life advice for five cents. “Good grief,” he mutters, walking over to her. “I’m so depressed. My husband is dying and I have so many regrets.”

“There’s no use in regrets,” says Diane. “You can’t change the past. All you can do is try to improve yourself moving forward.”

“I screwed it all up. It’s too late for me, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know. I’m just a crazy drug hallucination, I’ll say whatever you want.”

He gulps. “Then tell me it’s not too late.”

“Well, it’s not too late! It’s never too late.”

“Yeah, right.”

“It’s never too late to be the person you want to be. You need to choose the life you want.”

* * *

“Jesus, Herb, thank you!”

In the excitement, he can’t hold back, and when he kisses BoJack, the horse doesn’t push him away. There’s no fear-induced hesitation that forces both of them to pretend they don’t enjoy it; they let the kiss live a natural life without being cut short, and it ends with the same excitement and glee that prompted it in the first place.

There’s a long, heavy silence.

“Shit,” mumbles Herb, blushing. “I, um, I’m not…”

The lie dissolves in his mouth. “You sure?” asks BoJack, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. “Cause, um, it’s okay if you are…”

“...No,” insists Herb. “I’m definitely not.”

“You  _ sure?”  _ the horse presses. “Cause, now that I think about it, it’s kinda weird that you chose  _ me  _ of all people to be on your show, or that you insisted that it had to be a horse in the first place.” There’s a short pause. “Also, you just kissed me.”

“That was a bit of a giveaway, wasn’t it?”

“No doy.”

The two make eye contact, and a smile crosses each of their lips.

* * *

“Ran into Ed at the hardware store,” he mutters as he hangs his coat up. “He said we’re in for ‘some weather’.”

“Why do people say that?” asks Herb. 

“Exactly! What is ‘some weather’ meant to mean?”

“There’s never not weather.” There’s a long, heavy silence. “Hey, BJ… remember that thing we discussed yesterday?”

“What thing?” asks BoJack.

“The thing, you know … the  _ thing.” _

“Oh,  _ that  _ thing.” He pauses. “What about it?”

“Well,” mumbles Herb. “I was looking on the Internet, which is a relatively recent phenomenon as of 2000 -- the year which it currently is -- and there’s only one adoption agency in the area that accepts gay couples. There’s this adorable little horse girl there, and, well, she has a diamond on her forehead just like yours, and…”

BoJack smiles. “Okay.”

* * *

Harper Honey Kazzaz-Horseman splashes her boyfriend, and BoJack sighs fondly. “They grow up so fast.”

“I don’t know,” mutters Herb uneasily. “He drives a motorcycle.”

“He drives a Vespa, that’s totally different.”

“Okay, okay.” There’s a short silence, and then Herb gives a sad sigh. 

“What are you thinking about?” asks BoJack.

“...Just how nice things could have been, if you hadn’t waited so long to tell me how you felt.”

* * *

He wakes up some seven hours later with an empty cereal box on his head.

“Wha?” He removes the cereal box and discovers that he’s in the kitchen, with Herb standing a few feet away. He groans. “What did I do while I was high?”

Herb gestures toward the messy room, the brooms on the floor, the scattered pages of paper all over the bench. “I feel like a better question would be, what  _ didn’t  _ you do?”

“Ugh.”

“Princess Carolyn called while you were out,” explains Herb. “She said the autobiography you sent her was … complete gibberish and mostly erotic  _ Doctor Who  _ fanfiction.”

“Why am I not surprised?” He pours himself a glass of water. “Could you call Diane and tell her we can use her book? And, uh, tell her I said sorry about all the shit I said earlier.”

“Okay, I’ll call her later on. You should rest. Sarah Lynn’s already gone home, and Todd’s in the guest room.” 

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“...Herb?”

“Yes?”

“...Can I ask you a question?”

Herb mimes playing a trumpet and does his best attempt at an acapella cover of fanfare, as per a previously-established inside joke. “Yes?”

“Do you … Do you think it’s too late for me?”   
Herb turns, frowning. “What?”

“I mean, am I just doomed to be the person that I am?” BoJack’s voice breaks as he talks, and he’s on the edge of tears, but he can’t break down, not in front of Herb. “The -- The person in Diane’s book? It’s -- It’s not too late, Herb, I need you to tell me that it’s not too late.”

“...BoJack, I --”

“I need you to tell me that you love me and I’m a good person.” He clears his throat. “I know that I can be selfish and narcissistic and self-destructive, but underneath all that, deep down, you love me because I’m a good person, and I need you to tell me that I’m good, Herb.”

He swears he can almost hear Harper’s nonexistent giggles, reminding him of what he’s given up.

“Tell me, please, Herb.” He wills himself not to cry. “Tell me that you love me and that I’m good.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“BJ…” mumbles Herb uneasily. He finally concedes and says those three simple words.

“I love you.”

Those are the only three words he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Harper is Hollyhock in this, in case it wasn't clear enough. canon!Harper is basically just Beatrice without the curled mane, which makes sense in the context of Downer Ending, but it makes less sense in this fic, since (1) bojack in this fic is sliiightly more comfortable with his relationship or lack therof with his parents since herb reminds him that what they did to him wasn't okay, and (2) herb and BJ would have to adopt instead of having biological kids so there would be no reason for the kid to look just like Beatrice  
> and anyway, I wrote a scene where Herb notices Hollyhock's existence in chapter 2, and at one point I considered making an AU where herb and bojack adopt hollyhock (which I eventually decided not to do just because they probably wouldn't name her hollyhock and it would feel weird to call her by a different name) so I figured eh, what the hell. (for those who are curious, I do have plans for a regular, non-Harper!Hollyhock to appear, but not until later on)


	5. Still Broken

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herb's cancer goes into remission and they throw a party to celebrate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> at one point a commenter said something along the lines of "if you kill herb I might cry" and I happened to read it while I was writing this chapter. so I replied to their comment saying something along the lines of "well im not going to tell you that he dies, but I am going to tell you that he dies of a car crash in canon caused by the brakes going out and chapter 4 literally references his dodgy brakes three separate times, one of which was in the context of it being a Chekhov's gun which is basically the narrative equivalent to waving around a big red sign saying THIS IS IMPORTANT"
> 
> note that I never actually said he dies

_ I’m gonna live forever! #Cancerfree #Invincible #TweetingInThePassengerSeat As of 2015 -- the year which it currently is -- I’m officially _

“Shit!” yelps BoJack, scrambling to slam his foot onto the brakes. 

The car lurches to a stop and the horse breathes a sigh of relief, but Herb is more annoyed than anything. “You made me press post on my tweet too early! Now it’s just cut off in the middle of a sentence.”

“So?” chokes BoJack, gesturing wildly. “We almost hit that truck!” He squints at the truck. “And I think it’s full of peanuts! Imagine if you survived the cancer and the car crash, and then died from a peanut allergy?”

“That would be  _ incredibly  _ unlikely.”

“Yeah, except it almost just happened because of these stupid-ass brakes!”

“Well, we’ll get the brakes fixed soon.” There’s something about Herb’s voice that always manages to calm BoJack down. “In the meantime, I’m cancer-free! We’ve gotta celebrate.”

“...Yeah.” A smile crosses his lips. “God, I think it’s just sinking in now. You’re gonna be okay.”

“Better than okay,” corrects Herb. “We’re gonna be great.”

* * *

The party that they throw that night is a wild one. Joelle and Bradley come home for a reunion and somehow end up in a very competitive Sherlock Holmes trivia game, which devolves into an even more competitive pillow fight. Princess Carolyn attends with the goal of gaining some clients and is accidentally telling Mr. Peanutbutter a fictional recount of her adventures with Herb before the night is over. An owl who doesn’t even know Herb shows up to promote her new TV show,  _ Ollywoo Stars And Celebrities! What do they know? Do they know things? Let’s find out!,  _ and ends up in another coma.

Herb very clearly stated that no illegal drugs were to be taken to the party, and that all alcohol must be clearly marked as such. However, he also very clearly stated that Sarah Lynn was allowed and encouraged to attend, so really any confusion was his fault. 

The phone rings on the counter several times throughout the day and night, but it’s not until it makes its presence known a fifth time when it’s finally in the owner’s pocket that the caller can get a response. 

“Hello?” says BoJack Horseman into his phone, while hanging upside-down from a broken light fixture attached to the ceiling.

“Where have you been?!” hisses Kelsey. “I’ve been trying to contact you all day!”

“Oh, Herb’s cancer-free now,” he explains. “So we’re having a small party to celebrate.” 

“That does  _ not  _ sound like a small party.”

“Really, it is,” insists BoJack. “Just a small gathering with Herb’s friends, and -- oh, sorry, let me put you on hold for a sec.” He holds a hand over the phone’s microphone and yells across the room, “Joelle, you piece of shit! The curious incident is the  _ lack  _ of curious incident! Have you even read  _ The Adventure of Silver Blaze?!” _

He speaks back into the phone. “Sorry about that, there’s a very competitive Sherlock Holmes trivia game slash pillow fight going on. Anyway, what’s up?”

“We’re making some changes to the shooting schedule,” she explains, tone low and conspiratorial. “Lenny’s trying to cut the Nixon scene, so the plan is to shoot it as soon as possible before he officially says we’re not allowed to, and then once he sees it he’ll love it so much he’ll change his mind.”

“I dunno if I’ll be good for filming tomorrow, I might be  _ sliiiiightly  _ hungover. The day after should be fine, though.”

“Okay. And, uh, you might wanna practice crying, since you’ll have to for that scene.”

There’s a long, empty pause, and he can tell that she’s waiting for some sort of ‘okay, bye’ response. He gulps. “I don’t cry in front of people.”

“Well, it’s part of the scene, so you kinda have to.”

“No, I mean, I  _ can’t  _ cry in front of people. Not since I was a kid. I-I can’t.”

“That’s why you’ve got time to practice.” 

It’s impossible to argue with Kelsey, so he concedes defeat. He hangs up, puts his phone back in his pocket, and yells at Bradley about how  _ he should know  _ about what really happened to Silver Blaze. The party continues. 

* * *

It’s a little after midnight, around one in the morning, when Joelle somehow “wins” the Sherlock Holmes trivia game/pillow fight. It’s not entirely clear how she does this, or what the winning terms even are in the first place, but her victory is clear, kind of. Sarah Lynn snorts another line of  _ something --  _ Herb doesn’t know what it is and he doesn’t want to know -- and decides she’s playing the same batshit crazy “game” against Joelle, to see who the true champion is.

Todd and Mr. Peanutbutter are in the middle of discussing their idea for a “reverse football game halftime show” -- a long musical concert with a short football game in the middle -- when Herb breaks in on their conversation. “Have you two seen BoJack?”

“Not since around midnight,” says Todd. “But while you’re here, can you help us with our latest plan?”

“...Maybe?”

“Perfect!” He grins at Mr. Peanutbutter. “Has this ever happened to you?”

He gestures toward the dog, who puts a hand on his chin thoughtfully. “Wow, I really want to listen to some music and get the opportunity to see my favourite pop stars live. But, I also want to catch a ball!”

“What? No! Why would that have ever happened to me?!” Herb groans. “I don’t have time for this, I have to go find BoJack. I’ll see you later.”

He shakes his head at their antics as he walks off, wandering the house in search of BoJack. He’s nowhere to be found among the partying guests, and a quick survey of the yard reveals that he’s not outside and the car’s still in the driveway. BoJack isn’t the type of person to walk somewhere when he could instead drive -- that’s why the car’s brakes  _ still  _ haven’t been fixed -- so the chances that he’s left are slim. He’s not hopeful when he checks the bedroom, just on the off chance that the horse somehow ended up in there, and he certainly doesn’t expect to be right.

But he is.

He’s sitting there, on the bed, turned away from the door. Even in the low light, there’s no mistaking the shuddering of his shoulders. Herb can hardly believe what he’s seeing. BoJack  _ doesn’t  _ cry. It simply does not happen. The thing is, when you know someone for thirty years and are in a relationship with them for most of that time, you  _ know  _ them inside and out, and you  _ know  _ whether or not they cry. And BoJack doesn’t.

“...BJ?”

An animalistic  _ neigh  _ escapes him as he turns sharply. “Shit. Herb, I, uh -- You should go back to the party.” 

Herb frowns. “Are you okay?”

“Y-Yeah. I’m fine. Go back to the party.” His voice is shaky and uneven, and he tries with varying degrees of success to wipe his eyes without it being obvious.

“You don’t sound fine.” He sits next to the horse on the bed. “What’s up?”

There’s a long, painful silence.

BoJack flops down onto the bed and sighs. “You know, a couple years back, I went to a Jack in the Box, and the girl there asked me if I was having an awesome day. You know, not ‘how are you doing?’ but ‘are you having an  _ awesome  _ day?’. There was this one girl there that always said it like that, and I don’t know, it annoyed me, because then it’s on me for being the negative one if I’m not having an  _ awesome day.  _ So even if you feel like shit you have to act positive unless you’re, like, dying.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Sorry, what does this have to do with … anything?”

“I’m getting there, I’m getting there. Point is, one day I went in and she asked me if I was having an  _ awesome day,  _ and I’m about to lie and say I am, but I realise this time I actually have an excuse, so I say no, actually, I’m having an  _ unbelievably  _ shitty day. So she asks me what’s wrong, and I say that my husband’s dying of cancer.”

“But I’m not anymore,” says Herb, placing a hand on BoJack’s knee. “I’m okay now.”

“I know. And I’m so glad you’re okay. I -- I was so scared for you, I swear to God, I don’t know what I would have done if you did die, but…” He sighs. “I don’t know. One day I’m going to go to the Jack in the Box and that girl’s going to ask me if I’m having an  _ awesome day.  _ And I’m going to tell her that I’m having a shit day, and she’ll ask what’s wrong. And I’m not going to have an answer.”

There’s a pause. “I’m not sure I understand what you mean.”

“It’s like…” He sighs. “I always thought that the day when I found out you’d be okay would be the happiest day of my life. And it  _ is _ . But … I’m not  _ happy.  _ I’m just less sad.”

Herb flops down onto the bed. “I think you need help.”

BoJack shakes his head. “Who could help  _ me?” _

“Therapists. Psychiatrists. AA. That’s just off the top of my head. BJ, listen to me. There’s nothing wrong with seeking help.”

“Yeah,” counters BoJack. “Except, what if I go in there and the therapist or whatever talks to me and tries to figure out what the problem is, and all he can find is that I’m broken? And he tries to help me, but none of it works, and I go to all that effort and I’m still broken?”

“That’s not going to happen.” He sighs. “Promise me that you’ll at least think about it.”

“...Yeah, sure, I’ll think about it,” says BoJack, in a tone that very clearly communicates that he won’t think about it. “I dunno.” He sits up. “I don’t think I really  _ need  _ help, you know? What I  _ really  _ need…” Herb’s phone buzzes but they both ignore it. “...is an escape from L.A.”


	6. Escape to LA

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herb and BoJack head to New Mexico to visit an old friend.

He finally zips up the red bag and slings it over his shoulder, hoping nobody will notice the white text on the side that clearly labels it as containing “spy shit”, whatever that means. He sighs. “Are you sure you’re ready?”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Ready for what, a vacation? What do you think’s gonna happen?”

“I don’t know. It’s New Mexico, I bet all sorts of crazy shit happens in New Mexico.” He downs a glass of what Herb hopes is water but realistically thinks is probably vodka. “Besides, are you sure it’s a good idea to have a depressed alcoholic and Todd looking after the house for a week?” At Todd’s glare, he adds, “No offense, Todd, it’s just … you have a tendency to get wrapped up in some ridiculous scheme that leaves you with no time to clean up Diane’s mess.”

“It’s fine,” says Todd, in a tone that clearly implies that it’s not fine. “I should be keeping out of trouble now that I’m doing improv, which isn’t a cult. And Diane should be fine.”

He gestures to Diane, who is currently yelling at Goober to go home. In her laughter she knocks over her expertly-constructed pyramid of empty beer bottles, which she then proceeds to yell at Todd for.

“She’ll be fine,” insists Herb. “She just needed some time to recover from Cordovia, that’s all. She’ll probably be gone by the time we’re back.”

“...If you insist,” says BoJack, defeated. He takes a large green backpack from the counter and holds the front door open. “Herb?”

With a quick wave to Todd and Diane, Herb goes out to the car. BoJack mutters a quick, “Be good, you two!” before he goes, and Todd and Diane’s vague protests that they absolutely won’t be good fall on deaf ears. By the time he gets to the car, Herb is already in the passenger seat; he tosses their bags into the back, then gets into the driver’s seat.

“You’re  _ sure  _ you’re up for this?”

“BJ, I’m fine.” He places a hand on BoJack’s knee. “I know you worry about me a lot, but I’ve been cancer-free for months now. I’m gonna be fine. Besides, Charlotte’s been wanting to see us in person again for  _ years.” _

He sighs in defeat. “Okay.”

“I’ll text her now to tell her we’re on the way.”

“Okay, but be careful. You do have a tendency to get your phone lost in the alternate dimension under the glovebox.”

“That happened  _ one  _ time!”

They laugh together, and continue driving.

* * *

“And that,” finishes BoJack. “Is how I turned Hollywood into Ollywoo.”

“I helped,” interjects Herb.

“No you didn’t.”

Charlotte laughs. “Well, I see you two have been keeping busy.”

“Yeah, BJ’s filming Secretariat at the moment,” explains Herb. “It’s a miracle we managed to get time off for the visit.”

“Ugh, it’s totally bullshit,” rants BoJack. “I swear to God, there was this whole thing when Lenny -- the producer -- was gonna cut the Nixon scene, so my director screwed over the whole schedule just to get it filmed before he could officially tell her not to.”

“What happened?” asks Charlotte.

“Uh, the plan was that she’d film it, and it’d be so great he’d  _ have  _ to include it. Except, thing is, I was meant to cry for the scene and I couldn’t, so when she showed it to him without any crying, he decided to cut it.”

“...So you decided to do what your boss told you to do and not do the scene?”

“No, of course, that would be too safe. Thing is, I’ve got this roommate, Todd, that the director really likes. So they sort of teamed up and got into a series of bizarre and improbable schemes trying to make me cry.”

“...And then you cried for the scene and everything was fine?”

“No, the director got fired.”

“I don’t know what I expected.” She sighs fondly. “You haven’t changed.”

Their conversation is interrupted by Penny loudly expressing her disgust at Trip’s erection, and they finish breakfast with as little task as they can.

* * *

He’s in the middle of some polite but meaningless spiel about how he’s so glad they invited him and he’s happy to help them with anything needed when Penny starts complaining.

“Mom!” she whines. “Dad was supposed to take me driving after school today, but now he’s gotta take Trip to his dumb-ass basketball game.”

“It’s the quarter-finals!” protests Trip.

“You’ll just get a hard-on in the game.”

“Now I will get a hard-on because you made me think about it. Thanks a lot.”

He shamefully walks back inside, hands over his crotch, and Charlotte sighs. “I’ll take you driving this weekend.”

“I need to practice  _ every day.  _ I’m the only senior who doesn’t have a license. It’s embarrassing!”

“Well, I’ve got the store, and …” She pauses. “BoJack? Herb? Could one of you take her?”

“I’ll take her,” volunteers BoJack. “Herb can’t be trusted in the passenger seat, he manages to lose his phone in the alternate dimension under the glovebox.”

“That happened  _ one  _ time!” protests Herb. 

Charlotte ignores him. “Your car’s safe, right?” she asks. “Like, properly maintained and everything?”

BoJack’s mind flutters back to the car’s dodgy brakes. But, it’ll be fine. It’s easy to work around. “Yeah, it’s safe.”

“Then by all means, go ahead and take her.”

Penny’s eyes light up, and he knows he’s made the right choice.

* * *

She spends the entire car ride gushing about Diego Mendoza, driving by his house repeatedly in the hope that he’ll come out to check the mail, but he never does. 

He takes her driving the next day, and the day after that, too. She grows increasingly frustrated with Diego’s refusal to check his mail. It’s the fourth day of their visit when she declares in the middle of dinner time that she’s not in “a mood”, immediately before telling everyone else at the table to “get bent” and declaring that she hates her life and wants to be dead.

She stomps off and Charlotte goes upstairs to talk to her; Herb follows, as the designated compassionate. Somehow, they get BoJack to agree to go with a goddamn seventeen-year-old to prom.

She introduces him to her friends before they go, since they’re carpooling together. There’s Maddy, her “best friend”, and Pete “Repeat”, whose “whole thing” is that he repeats everything he says, which he consistently forgets to do. 

In a nutshell, the situation is this: BoJack F. Horseman, who once said that the idea of being responsible for his own happiness was depressing because he can’t even be responsible for his own breakfast, is responsible for three teenagers.

What could possibly go wrong?

* * *

He hears slurping from the back seat.

“What are you drinking?”

“Nothing,” answers Maddy.

He holds a hand out to the back seat. “Hand it over.”

“Fine.” He feels a can being placed into his hand and he takes a sip from it. “Ugh.” He barely manages to swallow it down. “Red Bull and vodka? What are you, twelve? I was  _ going  _ to say I would let you keep it if you gave me some, but I’d get sick from drinking all that sugar.”

“Old man,” jokes Penny.

BoJack sighs. “Tell you what, keep your Red Bull and vodka. But for the love of God, don’t get too drunk, stay hydrated, and nobody tell your parents I had this conversation.”

“Awesome!” exclaims Pete. “Wait. How many times did I just say awesome? Was it twice or was it once? ...Ah, it was probably twice.”

* * *

His attempt to “take it back to 1991, when a new funky fresh dance craze took this nation by storm” is not a complete success.

He barely finishes the first line of  _ Do the BoJack  _ before he’s met with a crowd of booing and sneering teens. “God, no!” he yells, physically recoiling. “This is not the immediate praise I expected!”

“My flask got empty,” whines Maddy, who clearly didn’t obey BoJack’s rules of not getting too drunk. “Can we go to the car and, uh, get more?”

“Or we could just go to the car and just leave.”

Penny  _ tsks  _ childishly. “You can’t just  _ leave  _ prom.”

“Of course you can,” says BoJack. “You’re young. You can do whatever you want. That’s what they never tell you until it’s too late.”

Penny sighs. “Where would we go?”

“I dunno. Maybe home, maybe somewhere else to hang out, maybe just for a drive around. You can pick.”

Her eyes light up. “...Okay.”

Pete takes his drunken girlfriend outside and BoJack unlocks his car door. Penny steps into the driver’s seat and BoJack gets in beside her while Pete and Maddy get into the back. “Where are you planning on going?” asks BoJack as she starts the car up. 

“I dunno. Just for a drive, I guess.”

The car accelerates. “Isn’t that a little over the speed limit?”

“I think we’re good.” There’s a short, awkward silence. “So what happened with your director?”

“Pretty much exactly what I told you at breakfast the other day. She got fired trying to make me cry, and now she’s probably pissed at me so I’m too scared to talk to her.” He forces a chuckle. “It’s good to get to see you again, Penny. Gosh, you probably wouldn’t even remember the last time I visited.”

“I do, kind of. I think I was around seven?”

“Yeah, you would have been. Trip was just a little kid.”

“Herb looked so different back then, I could barely recognize him when you guys first came.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Yeah,” mutters BoJack. “That’d be the cancer.”

“Sorry,” mumbles Penny.

“It’s fine --”

“No, sorry, that was insensitive.” She pauses. “He’s fine now, though, right?”

“Yeah, he’s been in remission for a while. Still, it was, uh…” He rubs the back of his neck uneasily. “It was really scary for us, you know? For a while we were both sure he would die.” He sighs. “I’d better text Charlotte so she knows where we are.”

He takes out his phone. Penny continues driving. “Shit!” he yells.

“What?” asks Pete.

“I dropped my phone under the glovebox! Ugh, I’m just like Herb.” He spends a few seconds trying to find it with his feet, then relents. He unbuckles his seatbelt and goes down in search of it.

This takes a long time.

Penny gives him a look. “Uh, you found it yet?”

“Herb was right! There  _ is  _ an alternate dimension under here!”

“Really?” asks Maddy.

“Uh, not literally, but it’s really big and dark, so it’s hard to find anything. God dammit.” He continues to fumble around in search of his phone, banging his head on the bottom of the glovebox and swearing loudly at regular intervals, while Penny watches him with amusement. Finally, he feels an object that may be a phone, or possibly just anything else that’s smooth and solid, it’s hard to tell when he can’t see. “Okay, I think I found it.”

“Well, hurry up and --  _ shit!” _

He’s about to ask what she’s so freaked out about when he feels himself lurching forward. He slams violently against the front of the car and grunts as pain shoots through his body. The impact knocks the wind out of him, badly, and he struggles to get a full breath, but every attempt at breathing sends a stabbing pain through his chest. 

“BoJack?” calls someone uncertainly -- one of the kids? He thinks Pete. “Are you okay?”

“...Y-Yeah,” he manages to say. “Just, uh, gimme a second.”

He manages to find his phone somewhere in the alternate dimension under the glovebox. He uses it as a torch to figure out where everything actually  _ is.  _ Every movement is painful but he somehow manages to climb back onto the seat.

He struggles to catch his breath. “Shit, what just happened?”   
“We hit a tree,” answers Pete.

“Shit…” He glances over at Penny, shining the light from his phone on her. She’s silence and unmoving. Heart racing, he leans over to put two fingers on her neck to check for a pulse. He sighs in relief. “Penny’s unconscious but alive. Maddy, Pete? How are you two?”

“Uh, my neck hurts, but I think I’m okay,” says Pete. “Maddy’s pretty drunk but she doesn’t seem too badly hurt. What about you, are you okay?”

“...I’ll be good,” BoJack mutters, grimacing in pain. “Shit… Look, it’s all gonna be okay. I’ll call an ambulance now.”

He unlocks his phone with shaking hands and gulps down whatever fear he may have. These kids need him.

* * *

If there’s one thing he’s learned from the time he broke his arm in the fourth grade, it’s that you can escape from hospitals by using your sheets to make a rope to climb out the window. If there’s one thing he learns from going to New Mexico, it’s that escaping through the door and hoping nobody notices is probably easier.

“You sure you’re allowed out of your room?” asks Herb anxiously.

“Honestly, no,” answers BoJack. “But whether it’s allowed or not, I’m pretty sure it’s safe.”

“Only  _ pretty sure?” _

“Oh, quit worrying.” He waves a hand dismissively and then promptly winces at the movement. “It’s just a couple broken ribs, I’m not going to die. I’m only still here so they can write me a prescription for pain meds.”

“And for Penny.”

“Penny.” He sighs, which causes him to wince again. “How’s she doing?”

“Charlotte hasn’t started screaming yet, so I presume she’s okay.”

“God, I hope she is. Do you know what room she's in?”

“Through here, follow me.”

He follows Herb through to Penny’s room, where the young deer is lying asleep on a hospital bed. Charlotte is sitting on the end of the bed, while Trip and Kyle over her.

BoJack gulps. “Is she okay?”

Charlotte looks up. “Yeah, she'll be okay. She should wake up soon. What about you?”

“A few broken ribs but I'm okay.”

There's a short silence.

“It was you that called the ambulance, wasn't it?”

“Uh, yeah.” He rubs the back of his neck nervously.

“She was pretty badly concussed. If she hadn't gotten medical attention quickly, well…”

He gulps. “I did what anyone else would have done.”

“Well, you saved her life.”

“It's just a good thing I found my phone. And got out of the alternate universe under the glovebox.” At their raised eyebrows, he adds, “I dropped my phone under the glovebox and I was trying to get it out when we crashed.”

“I won't say I told you so,” says Herb.

“You absolutely will.”

“You're right. I told you so.”

There's a long, awkward silence. The silence only breaks when an instrumental version of the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ theme fills the room.

“Shit, is that your phone or mine?” asks BoJack.

“It's mine,” answers Herb, taking it out of his pocket. “I'd better go outside to take it, it's Todd.”

He exits the room and Charlotte raises an eyebrow. “You live together and have the same ringtone?”

“Hey, he made the show, he should get to use it as a ringtone.”

“I guess. Who's Todd?”

“Our roommate. He's meant to be looking after the house.”

“...Mom?”

The room’s occupants all turn sharply. Penny stares at them with half-closed eyes.

In an instant Charlotte is on it, bombarding her with as many kisses as she can stand while she struggles to push her away. “Mom!” she whines. “It's okay. I'm okay!”

Charlotte finally relents, but remains close to her. “Do you remember what happened?”

“...Kinda?” she mumbles, raising a hand to her forehead. “We left early, and I went for a drive. BoJack dropped his phone and I was distracted.”

“Well, obviously don't get distracted while driving, or you might hit a tree.”

“That's the thing,” she says, frowning. “I saw the tree, I had time to stop, but when I pressed the brakes they just… didn't work.”

Charlotte frowns. “What do you mean?”

BoJack slips out of the room.

* * *

“Well, I don't know, maybe ask Mr. Peanutbutter?” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “What do you need sixty-two and a half basketballs for anyway?” He glances up. “Look, I gotta go, I think BoJack wants me.” 

He shakes his head as the horse runs into view, and frowns. He’s  _ running,  _ actually running, which isn’t something BoJack does often, and certainly isn’t something he would be in any hurry to attempt with broken ribs. Putting his phone back in his pocket, he starts walking, and eventually meets him in the hallway.

“Herb,” he pants, properly  _ pants,  _ truly  _ fighting  _ for a full breath of air. “We -- We have to go -- we have to --”

“Woah, BJ, calm down.” He places his hands on BoJack’s shoulders. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not,” he insists, trying to push past Herb. “We have to  _ go,  _ we have to --”

“BoJack?”

BoJack stops dead at the voice, and turns shamefully to face Charlotte. He gulps. 

“Herb, BoJack?”

“Yeah?” answers Herb.

“Did your car have dodgy brakes?”

The blood drains from Herb’s face. “Shit. Oh my God, I completely forgot about that.”

“You  _ forgot?!”  _ chokes Charlotte. “You can’t just  _ forget  _ whether your car is safe to drive! I  _ asked  _ you if it was safe! Did you still  _ forget  _ when I asked?!”

BoJack audibly gulps. “We -- We got so used to it, we didn’t realise it was a big deal. We thought it would be fine --”

“My daughter could have  _ died.”  _ She glares daggers at the two of them. “For what? So that you wouldn’t have to sit in my car instead of yours?!”

“Charlotte,” begins BoJack. “I am so sorry --”

_ “Don’t.”  _ It’s more of a snarl than a statement at this point. “Don’t you  _ dare.  _ If you are not out of my sight within thirty seconds, I will call the police. And if you two  _ ever  _ try to contact me or my family again, I will  _ fucking  _ kill you.”

They don’t need telling twice.

* * *

They try walking at first, because walking is the slowest mode of transport, and thus the way they can keep going for the longest before they have to actually answer the question of where they’re going with a destination rather than a vague direction and a concrete sense of wanting to get  _ away.  _ When BoJack inevitably finds himself too out of breath to continue, they hail a taxi. The taxi driver asks where they want to go.

They stare at each other in silence for several seconds.

“Santa Fe,” answers BoJack.

“What?” asks Herb.

“I don’t know, we’ll probably buy a car there or something. Or a boat.”

“A boat?!”

“Eh, you never know.”

“We are  _ not  _ buying a boat.”

Some time later, just like in a sitcom, they buy a boat. They treat it like it’s a sitcom joke, and not a pathetic attempt to throw money into the whole in their hearts, or to feel like they’ve gained  _ something  _ from the visit to make up for what they’ve lost. Besides, the boat has free delivery, so it’s an easy way home.

They still need a car, but that is a problem for Future Herb and BoJack. Present Herb and BoJack are rather busy lying on the top of their completely unnecessary boat as the truck drives them home, staring at the traffic.

“We really screwed up, didn’t we?” asks BoJack.

Herb sighs. “Yeah. We did.”

Diane is still there when they get home, though she’s at least had the decency to keep the house relatively clean, or maybe that was just Todd cleaning up after her. They question Herb and BoJack about the boat.

They don’t get answers.

* * *

He groans in pain and sleepily swats the hand away.

“BJ, come on.”

He tries to pretend he’s still asleep, but the way he so quickly blocks Herb’s hands when he tries to shake his shoulders again rather gives the act away. “Don’t do that, it hurts.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “I thought it was your ribs that were hurt.”

“Yeah, and it hurts my ribs when you move my shoulders.” He groans. “I don’t get it either, just don’t do it again, okay?”

“Sorry, I won’t.” He sighs. “It’s ten AM, you have to get up.”

BoJack finally opens his eyes properly and gapes at him like he’s just told him that he has to get up at two in the morning. “That’s not even late.”

“It  _ is,  _ BJ,” insists Herb. “and just because you’ve been sleeping in until noon for the past two weeks doesn’t mean it’s healthy.”

“My ribs hurt,” he mutters, waving a hand dismissively. “Besides, maybe I’ll lose weight if I sleep in for so long that I have to just eat lunch as my first meal of the day.”

Herb sighs. He lowers himself onto the bed, being careful not to jostle the horse too much, and runs a hand through his mane affectionately. “BJ, can I be honest with you?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“You  _ need  _ to take responsibility for your own happiness. And before you can be responsible for your happiness, you need to be responsible for your own breakfast.”

BoJack turns to look at him, so utterly hopeless, so completely consumed by guilt.  _ “How?”  _ he whispers, his voice weak, so vulnerable that even the most heartless would have to admit that he clearly  _ genuinely  _ doesn’t know where to start.”

“Just make it.” His voice is soft and reassuring. “Just get up and make some cereal. Or cook something. Whatever you want.”

“Ugh, it’s so  _ hard,”  _ whines BoJack.

“It gets easier,” says Herb.

“Huh?”

“Every day it gets a little easier. But you gotta do it every day. That’s the hard part. But it does get easier.”

There’s a long silence. BoJack finally starts to sit up.

“...Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoo, this chapter was fun to write!
> 
> I sort of set up two unofficial "rules" for myself while writing this fic: that every character that says fuck in canon has to do so here (with the obvious exception of herb, and also diane saying "motherfucker" when she finds out shes pregnant in season 3 since she doesn't technically say it on-screen), and that bojack can't cheat on herb for no reason other than to allow for things to go how they did in canon.
> 
> i.e. charlotte and todd still have to say "fuck" to bojack, and it still has to signify that their relationship with him is permanently damaged/ruined, but bojack isn't allowed to fuck Emily or try to fuck penny. which means I have to get kinda creative in what he can do that will hurt them!


	7. Start the Presses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack calls the L.A. Gazette, attempting to cancel his subscription.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quick little note to avoid confusion: since this fic is mostly in the present tense, I try to make it a little easier to recognize flashbacks by putting them in the past tense (though flashbacks within flashbacks, like diane telling the story of how she was late to work, are still hard to differentiate from normal flashbacks). 
> 
> also its REALLY hard to switch tenses every scene so lemme know if anything slipped past me

He continues to pace around his front yard, waving a newspaper around for emphasis. _“Don’t_ put me on hold. Do you know who I am? I just won a Baby’s Choice Award, the winner of which has gone to take home the _Oscar_ seven of the last fifteen years. So yeah, _that_ BoJack Horseman. Also known as the guy that you keep sending your dumb newspaper to even though I never subscribed to it!”

There’s a short pause.

“I’m putting you on hold.”

He continues to rant to himself as their stupid-ass hold music starts playing as obnoxiously as possible. The voice that finally answers him is a feminine one, gentle but firm. “Hello, good morning, and I say this with absolute sincerity: How can I help you?”

“I never subscribed to the _L.A. Gazette,”_ he explains for what feels like the hundredth time. “I do not read the _L.A. Gazette. I_ have called this number _so many_ times to stop sending it to me. And yet every morning, I open my door to a new edition of the _L.A. Gazette!”_ He throws his hands up in frustration. “It’s like I’m in a boring episode of _The Twilight Zone.”_

“Sir, we are going to unravel this mystery.” God dammit, why does she have to talk like that? “But before we dig in, is there anything I can get you? A glass of ice water, perhaps?”

He’s taken aback a little by the offer. “Uh, yeah, sure. I’d love a glass of ice water.”

“Fabulous. Johnny will get that to you in, three, two, one…”

A whirring sound above him makes him turn around, and he sees a drone. Carrying a glass of water. Secretly impressed, he takes the water.

“I see you’ve been receiving our paper for six months,” says the woman. “But there’s no record of you ever registering a complaint. From whence the hostility, counselor?”

“It wasn’t a problem until recently,” explains BoJack. “Because up until a week ago my friend and roommate was making a giant paper-mache Todd’s head.”

“What was that?”

“I live with my husband Herb and my best friend Todd. Todd’s a good kid, but sometimes he gets ideas to do things.”

* * *

They woke up to see that a giant head was looming over them.

“Pretty scary, right?” said Todd.

“What the hell is that?!” choked BoJack.

“Giant Todd Head, of course. I’ve been working on him for the last six months.”

“What?” asked Herb. “Why?”

“It all started when a rustling from the kitchen jostled me from tender slumber.”

He told them a completely unnecessary story about precisely how the rustling from the kitchen jostled him from tender slumber, then gestured to the paper-mache head. “We might have an infestation! So I made the giant Todd head to scare away rats.”

* * *

“And?” asks the woman. “Did the head help to ameliorate your pest peccadillo?”

“No,” answers BoJack irritably. “Todd abandoned the project as soon as he started working on _Cabracadabra.”_

“What’s _Cabracadabra?”_

“That’s what I said.”

* * *

“What’s _Cabracadabra?”_ asked BoJack.

“That’s what I said,” answered Mr. Peanutbutter.

* * *

“What’s _Cabracadabra?_ ” asked Mr. Peanutbutter.

“That’s what we want you to say,” answered Todd.

Mr. Peanutbutter’s ears rose with excitement. “If I didn’t know any better, you were about to pitch an idea!”

“We _are_ about to pitch an idea,” said Emily.

“I do not know better.”

The two quickly moved some chairs so that they vaguely resembled the set-up of a car -- two seats in the front and three in the back. Todd sat down in what would be the driver’s seat, while Emily sat down behind him. “Has this ever happened to you?” he asked before turning to Emily. “Hey, where you headed?”

“Oh, yes,” said Mr. Peanutbutter. “That happens to me all the time!”

“We’re not at the main part yet.”

“I’m so sorry. Please continue.”

Emily cleared her throat. “To the opera, good sir.”

“Okay,” answered Todd, miming his hands on a steering wheel.

Mr. Peanutbutter raised his hand like a school child ready to ask a question. “Am I watching to see if the whole thing has happened to me? Or am I looking for one specific thing?”

“Kind of both.”

“So I just keep watching until I see something that’s happened to me?”

“Yes…”

“What if we get to the end and none of it has ever happened to me?”

Todd rubbed the back of his neck nervously. “Just try to put yourself in Emily’s shoes right now.”

“Got it. Sorry for the interruption. Please continue.”

Todd turned to Emily. “So, is this where you live?”

“Yes, it is,” answered Emily, sounding slightly uncomfortable. 

“Alone, or are you in a relationship?”

Emily recoiled. “This hardly seems appropriate. Driver, you’re starting to make me _uncomfortable.”_

“Yeah, Todd,” said Mr. Peanutbutter, rushing to her defense. “What are you doing?”

Both Todd and Emily stood up to signify that they have finished the pitch. “Has a creepy driver ever given you his number or told you that you reminded him of his dead girlfriend? Or repeated your address slowly, like he was trying to memorize it?”

“No, never,” said Mr. Peanutbutter, frowning.

“Unfortunately, if you are a woman all those things would happen to you every day.”

“That's right, Todd,” agreed Emily. “According to my own research, nine out of ten men are total dirtbag creeps, just the worst. But what if there was a ride-share service that could guarantee no creepy men drivers because there are no men drivers at all?” 

“What are you saying, robot drivers? What if they become sentient and try to murder us, or unionize? That could be a real headache.”

“No, not murderous robots. Women.”

Mr. Peanutbutter’s jaw dropped. “Todd, you have done it again.”

“Actually, Emily and I came up with it together.”

“Todd and Emily, you've done it again for the first time.”

* * *

“And that’s why we’re setting up shop in your house,” said Mr. Peanutbutter, having finished that completely unnecessary story. 

“Why does it have to be our house?” asked Herb, audibly annoyed.

“There’s no room in Mr. Peanutbutter’s house,” explained Todd. “It’s full of spaghetti strainers.”

“Why?”

“Who can recall?” answers Mr. Peanutbutter. “I figure the longer they’re there, the bigger the payoff. And they’ve been sitting there for months now, so you can bet the payoff’s going to be pretty huge.”

* * *

BoJack finishes telling the woman this completely unnecessary story. 

“So, why did you let them use your house?” she asks.

His mind flicks back to his brief eye contact with Emily as she was helping set up the Cabracadabra supplies.

“I felt guilty.”

“About what?”

He gulps. “Todd had this old girlfriend. I met her a couple weeks back.”

* * *

“Hey,” he muttered.

“Hey.”

“What are you doing up?” he asked.

“I got thirsty,” answered Emily.

He gestures toward the bar. “Then you came to the right place. Should we call Todd, see if he wants to join us?”

Emily looked down at the ground. “I’m tired of trying to figure out what Todd wants.”

BoJack frowned. “What do you mean?”

There was a long, awkward silence. 

“He won’t … you know…” She gestured vaguely, while BoJack stared at her in confusion. It wasn’t until she made a circle with her left hand and jammed her right finger into it that his eyes widened. 

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

They remained silent for a long time.

“Will you … ?” she asked.

“What? No!” he insisted. “I’m a married man, Emily. Besides, you’re, like, half my age.”

“I’m an adult,” she protested. “I can consent.”

“I know, but I kind of prefer people who _aren’t_ half my age. Nothing personal, just a preference. And even if you weren’t so young, I wouldn’t hurt Herb like that. Or Todd.”

She pouted childishly. “Todd’s the one that’s hurting me,” she said, crossing her arms. “He won’t have sex with me, no matter how much I want him to.”

“Well, I mean, he does have a right to say no.”

“I mean, yeah, but I have _needs,_ BoJack.”

“Okay, you know what?” He could feel his temper rising with frustration but he didn’t care. “No you don’t. You have _desires._ That’s a different thing. You don’t _need_ Todd to have sex with you, you _want_ him to.”

“Yeah, but, like, he kinda owes it to me, doesn’t he? I mean, we’re dating and everything.”

“Nobody _owes_ you anything, for God’s sake.” He slapped himself in the forehead. “If you don’t want to date him, then break up with him. It’s that simple.”

“I _do_ want to date him,” she insisted. “I just … want him to love me enough to have sex with me.”

“Jesus, Emily, are you listening to yourself?” He shook his head. “If this is how you feel about Todd, maybe you’re not good for him.”

“That’s not for you to decide.”

Anger rising and frustration at an absolute peak, he found himself yelling.

“It _is_ for me to decide that my _best friend’s_ girlfriend is a stupid _cunt_ that only cares about having sex with him and he _deserves better!_ Just get out of here, you piece of shit!”

There were tears in her eyes as she turned away from him, but it was too late to take his words back.

* * *

He sighs. “The worst part is that things have actually been going really well with Todd. Our friendship is in a really good place. Last week he said, ‘Did you know the wiener dog is neither a wiener nor a dog?’. And instead of saying, ‘Shut up, Todd’, I said, ‘Okay’.”

“So, why did you yell at Emily?” asks the woman. “Do you think some part of you was getting uncomfortable with that closeness? You felt like you didn’t deserve Todd’s friendship and wanted to externalise that feeling into action?”

“No, man, I just think I’m a dumb asshole. Can’t it just be that?”

“When you do bad things, you have something you can point to when people eventually leave you. It’s not you, you tell yourself, it’s that bad thing you did. Do you often keep people at arm’s length? Are you afraid of being known and knowing others?”

BoJack rubs the back of his neck nervously. “Yeah, you know, I think that you’re definitely hitting on something real that I would love to drill down into, but I gotta go to this marketing meeting now. Which is so annoying, because I totally want to keep talking about that thing that you’re talking about. But marketing meetings, right? I mean, they’re so important. Can I call you back tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

“Great. Bye.”

* * *

He calls her back the next day.

“So, how was your marketing meeting?” she asks.

“...Weird.”

* * *

Diane ran into the room, breathless and exhausted. “Sorry I’m late.”

“It’s fine, we’re just getting started.”

“I had the _worst_ morning.”

“We’re hanging on to every word. Don’t tell us.”

She told them anyway.

“So I drove here, right? I'm sitting at the entrance to the garage when I realize I don't have my key card. I gotta drive all the way home to get it. When I got there, I couldn't find it anywhere. Suddenly, I remember, I put it in the glove compartment. It was in my car the entire time.”

“Okay --”

“Except because I was driving back and forth so much, I ran out of gas. I pulled into a 76. I was about to pump the gas, I realized I didn't have my credit card, when I remembered it was on my desk at home because I used it to contribute to my friend's dumb Kickstarter campaign.”

* * *

“Have you donated to Virginia's dumb Kickstarter yet?”

Diane’s eyes widened. “Oh, shit.”

“Throw her 50 bucks. You can afford it.”

“Yeah, but I don't like feeling like I have to, Roxy. Does the world need a stop-motion short film about a pig who goes to circus school?”

“Think of it like you're doing a nice thing for your friend.”

She sighed. “Okay.”

* * *

“I called a cab to take me home to get my credit card. Then back to the gas station, get my car, fill it up and come here. So that's why I'm late.”

“Why did you tell us that whole story?”

Diane shrugged. “I don’t know.”

* * *

“Why did you tell me that whole story?” asks the woman.

BoJack shrugs. “I don’t know.”

He then proceeds to tell her in unnecessary detail about how the marketing meeting went. “Anyway,” he says, after finally finishing. “Why am I still getting the _L.A. Gazette?”_

“Do you think getting the paper every day is a reminder of Todd’s paper-mache head?” asks the woman. “The project he abandoned to make time for his old girlfriend, who you yelled at? Could that be why you want to cancel your subscription?”

“No, I want to cancel my subscription because newspapers are dumb. I feel I’m very clear on this point. Every morning, someone knocks on my door and says, ‘here, throw away this garbage for me’.”

“So you don’t feel any guilt about your fight with Emily?”

He sighs. “Well, I have had trouble sleeping.”

* * *

Their laughter kept him awake.

“Okay, your turn. Truth or dare?”

“Truth,” said Emily.

“Okay … hmm, what’s the worst thing anyone has said to you recently?”

Emily paled. “The worst thing or the most recent thing?”

“Both, I guess.”

“Uh…”

He stomped downstairs to yell at them.

“Can you keep it down, please?!” he yelled, doing the opposite of what he told them to do. “Some of us are trying to sleep!”

“We are keeping it down.”

“Yeah, we’ve been really quiet.”

“You’re basically shouting!” said BoJack, basically shouting.

They were about to offer to whisper when BoJack’s phone buzzed. It was a text from Herb, who was still in bed, requesting that he _please_ shut up about whatever it was he was yelling about. He groaned. “Ugh, I’m going to sleep in my boat.”

“Why does he have a boat?” whispered Emily as he left.

He walked into his boat, and was immediately stopped by a familiar woman. “Freeze, candy ass.”

* * *

“Hold on,” says the woman. “Are you telling me that esteemed character actress and fugitive from the law Margo Martindale has been living in your boat?”

BoJack hesitates. “Is this one of those situations where everything we discuss is confidential, due to customer service rep-client privilege?”

“Of course.”

“Then yes, Margo Martindale is living in my boat.”

He then proceeds to explain, in much more detail than is necessary, how Margo Martindale has been living in his boat.

The woman sighs. “Do you have someone you can talk to?”

He scoffs. “About what?”

“These feelings you have, your self-destructive behaviour. You know that old joke about how many psychiatrists does it take to screw in a lightbulb? The answer is just one, but the lightbulb has to _want_ to change.”

“I don’t know that joke.”

“That’s it. That’s the whole joke.”

He laughs. “Yeah. Psychiatrists are idiots.”

“That’s actually not the point of the joke.”

He takes a brief pause from the conversation to rudely yell at Margo, who attempts to tell him that she’s taking his boat, for trying to talk to him when he’s _clearly_ on the phone. “I don’t want to talk to anybody,” he insists stubbornly. “What I _want_ is to have control over my life. Which is why I’m begging you to please cancel my delivery of the _L.A. Gazette.”_

“I don’t think you want to do that.”

“I promise you I do.”

“No,” she insists. “Because that’s just theater. It allows you to think you’re in control, but the whole idea of control is a myth. The universe is a wild beast. You can’t tame it. All you can do is try to live inside it.”

“Live inside the beast?” He raises an eyebrow. “That’s a mixed metaphor. ...But you’re right.”

* * *

It’s some three days later when Herb comes inside with an annoyed look and an edition of the _L.A. Gazette_ in his hands. “I thought you canceled the subscription?”

“...So did I,” mumbles BoJack, brushing a hand to his forehead. “Those customer service people have a way of getting inside your head.”

Herb sighs. “You were on the phone with them for, like, an hour. What did you even get out of it if you didn’t get it canceled?”

“I learned that control is a myth and there’s no point in trying to act like I have control over everything in my life.”

Herb blinks.

“You got that from calling a newspaper company?”

“Yep.”

“Well, I guess it’s not a bad New Year resolution to take into 2016 -- the year which it currently isn’t yet -- if it helps.” He frowns. “Have you heard from Emily? Todd said she left but he wouldn’t explain why.”

“Nope, sorry, not a clue.” He takes the newspaper out of Herb’s hands. “I’ll go throw this out for you.”

“Thanks.”

The second he’s out of Herb’s sight, his face contorts with guilt and anxiety over the possibility of Todd knowing about how he yelled at Emily. But he can’t control it. He’ll just have to take it as it comes. He can burn that bridge when he gets to it.

He puts the newspaper in the trash can, and privately thinks that being incorrectly signed up for a newspaper he’s never read is the best thing that ever happened.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoo, this fic is turning into a doozy! like seriously. I write these on google docs and i was hoping this chapter would be a nice little breather chapter in between the angst of New Mexico and the angst to come, with minimal plot heaviness, but it ended up being so long that it made me decide that I would have a separate google doc for every season (except seasons 1 and 2, which are lumped together on google docs because I only did like 2 episodes from each + the two chapters that aren't based on any episode) because it was getting impractical to scroll through 30+ pages every time I wanted to update the fic
> 
> next up on That BJ Horseman AU: The Worst Thing That Ever Happened! We finally get to explore what BoJack's relationship with Princess Carolyn is like in an AU where they didn't have a relationship pre-series.


	8. A Thing That Happened

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following a long string of unprofessional behaviour that ends in him failing to get either of the movies he wanted and ruining his relationship with Kelsey, BoJack fires his agent.

She pawed at a large scratch toy that decorated her desk, forcing a smile in the hope that he’ll be able to hear it. “BoJack!” she said cheerfully. “Beautiful day, huh? Perfect day to go outside, not read the trades or talk to anyone in the industry or watch entertainment television or have a gut feeling about the ratings for your television show last night.”

BoJack groaned. “Princess Carolyn, I’m dying.”

Her face fell. “You read the trades.”

“My heart is in my stomach, my stomach is in my butt, and my butt ran away with the spoon.”

A smirk crossed her face and she couldn’t help herself. “That makes sense because your butt is quite a dish.”

There was a long, awkward silence.

“Princess Carolyn, I have a husband.”

He hung up without another word.

* * *

He watches with a shake of his head as Sandro walks out of view. Bull’s nets? What is that even supposed to mean? He turns his eyes back to his agent, ready for whatever defense she presumably has. She’s scarily good at pitches, but this time, he’s putting his foot down. Nothing she says can change his mind.

“I know you’re not happy about what happened with the Kelsey project,” she begins. “I pushed a little too hard to get you the money you deserve.” Of course, more excuses. “What can I say? Sometimes I’m too good of an agent, so deals fall apart. That’s a thing that happens when agents are really good.”

“It’s not --” interjects BoJack, but she continues before he can say anything.

“Moving forward! I know you’re not happy with how I handled  _ Ethan Around.” _

“Or didn’t handle it,” snarks BoJack.

“Bygones! It was because I was busy getting you the Pegasus movie, which I know you did not get, but trust me, you’ll see that getting these movies was the best thing that ever happened to you.”

Typical. More trademarked Princess Carolyn bullshit.

“Onwards and upwards!” she continues. “Tally ho! To the stars!”

He sighs. “Okay, you’re forcing me to use the cards.” He takes several small cue cards out of his pocket. “Princess Carolyn, clear throat, I have been very disappointed --”

“Ring!” says Princess Carolyn, in what may be the worst attempt at faking a ringing phone since the invention of phones. “Ring! It’s a king, I have to take this.”

She dashes off to the bathroom to take the “phone call” with the “king”, and comes back after a few minutes to celebrate the “anniversary” of their twenty-three years working together. She’s so busy singing about it that BoJack doesn’t have room to talk. She finally holds up his drink to him. “Let’s toast to another twenty-three years. What do you say?”

He takes a deep breath. “You’re fired.”

Her face falls.

“I can’t  _ believe  _ this!” yells the waiter. “You’re firing me!?”

“What? No!”

“You have no idea, everything I do around here! Half the kitchen staff is my family!”

“No --” attempts BoJack, but as seems to be the tradition for today, somebody cuts him off before he can finish.

“I  _ detest  _ you! I hope you rot in the hell! You washed-up has-been no-good joke! You are the opposite of an onion, because if I cut you, I am no gonna cry.”

BoJack stares at him. “Well, now you are fired.”

“Good luck finding another charming first-generation Italian immigrant with this kind of darling accent, who makes equally delightful malapropisms! You, sir, have just cut off your nose and thrown Sprite in your face! I am a classic stereotype that is tough to come by nowadays, because Italians don't emigrate so much to America no more. Botticelli, Barbarelli, Beetle Bailey! Modigliani, Masaccio, Marmaduke! Avanti, all of you! Andiamo!”

Several pairs of eyes turn to stare at BoJack as he laughs nervously. “So that was weird, huh? Please stop looking at me.”

Princess Carolyn clears her throat. “Too bad about Sandro, huh?”

“You’re the one that’s fired, obviously.”

“Right.” For just a second he thinks that maybe she gets it, finally. Half a second later she’s pitching some other idea.

He holds up a hand to stop her. “Great, but you don’t represent me anymore.”

“Okay, I’m fired, I get it. Sheesk. You’re gonna spend a couple days being mad at me, then I’ll get you another gig, and you’ll be my client again, just like every time. Can we get past the part where you’re mad at me and get to the part where you’re stealing General Lee’s plutonium to fuel your subterranean steam-punk slave-tram?”

He sighs and begins reading off of the cue cards again. “I think it’s best for both of us if we end this relationship once and for all.”

“I’m sorry I screwed up,” says Princess Carolyn, scrambling to defend herself. “You don’t have to read off the --”

“You take me for granted, made decisions that were against my wishes, and Emily started it.” He frowns. “How did that get in there?”

“What is that?” she asks.

“Part of my planned apology to Todd.”

“If you’re blaming Emily, it’s probably not a very good apology.”

“Well, she  _ did  _ start it.” He shuffles through the cards. “Here we go. Our relationship no longer has any yelling at Emily -- nope.”

“Who even is Emily?”

“Todd’s old girlfriend,” he explains as he continues shuffling through the cards. 

“What did you do?”

“Yelled at her.”

“Why?”

“It’s a long story -- professional integrity!” He places the Emily-related cards back in his pocket and begins reading again. “Our relationship no longer has any professional integrity, so it’s gotta end. Stand to leave. ...Shouldn’t have read that part.” He stands up. “When you reflect on this, you’ll see that it’s best for both of us. Exit restaurant. ...God dammit.”

He starts to leave but she runs after him, catching up outside the restaurant. “Who put you up to this? I bet it was Herb, he never liked me.”

“This has nothing to do with Herb,” says BoJack, temper rising.

“Oh, so you expect me to believe that your  _ husband  _ who  _ hates me  _ didn’t influence your decision at all?”

“Okay, first of all, he doesn’t  _ hate  _ you, he just thinks you’re not a good agent to me. Which, it’s pretty clear, he was right about. Second of all, if I was going to fire you because of him, wouldn’t I have done it long ago?”

“Then why?”

“You screwed up!” he finds himself yelling.

_ “Once! _ In twenty-three years!” She groans. “ _ All  _ these years I carried you, when  _ no one  _ wanted to work with you, I  _ still  _ managed to get you jobs! And then you would flake, or sabotage them, or get wrapped up in some crisis or emergency or vague sadness!”

“Well  _ excuse me  _ if the ‘vague sadness’ I was experiencing while my  _ husband was dying  _ was  _ inconvenient  _ for you!”

“You’re right, BoJack,” she says smugly. “This  _ is  _ for the best. I no longer have to carry your talentless, self-centered, self-sabotaging, dead weight carcass of faded talent around my neck.”

“Hey!” he interjects.

“I’m gonna go pour myself a little celebratory potato juice, because this is the best goddamn thing that’s ever happened to me.”

She walks back inside and BoJack stomps in after her, enraged. “You do not talk to me like that and walk away.”

“Oh, no?” she says mockingly. “What’s happening? This is so weird. I’m  _ walking away,  _ even though you told me not to. Right, I don’t work for you anymore.”

He attempts to continue berating her, but he’s interrupted by being made aware of a problem in the restaurant -- namely, that all the chefs have quit. Instead of attempting to actually solve the problem, he promotes the completely untrained waiter to become the sole chef, and goes over to Princess Carolyn, who is very obviously counting a possum’s teeth to show just how little she cares.

“You’re  _ thrilled  _ to have me out of your life? I was  _ such  _ a burden all these years. Know what I think?”

“Don’t wanna hear it.”

“You  _ like  _ being there to rescue me. You like it when I’m a mess, because it makes you feel good about yourself. Guess what? I never asked for that.”

“You ask all the time!” protests Princess Carolyn. “You have never not been asking me to rescue you.  _ ‘Princess Carolyn, help me! I insulted the gaffer’s wife and now he’s not lighting me properly!’ ‘Princess Carolyn, I threw up on Elle Fanning in a bounce house!’ ‘Princess Carolyn, why am I such a big stupid asshole?’” _

He groans. “Okay, great, more abuse. Right on schedule.”

“Oh, that’s  _ abuse?” _

_ “‘BoJack, you’re such a big stupid asshole!’ ‘BoJack, why were you even in the bounce house, dummy?’ ‘BoJack, why couldn’t you just be straight?’” _

Her face falls. “I never said I wanted you to be straight.”

“Didn’t have to,” he snarls. “You’re always saying it. And I don’t like being around you, because … I feel bad. You make me feel bad.”

“So this isn’t about me being a bad agent.”

“It’s about a lot of things.”

She sighs, and starts walking.

“Where are you going?”

“Away.”

She enters the ladies’ room. BoJack has a quick, annoying exchange with the waiter/chef who wants to steal his sweater, then follows her.

“Just so you know,” he scolds her. “This wasn’t an easy decision.”

“This is the ladies’ room!” yells a woman in a cubicle.

“I agonised over this, just ask Herb.”

“Oh, so you  _ did  _ ask Herb?”

“Of course I did, I respect his opinion.”

An animalistic screech escapes her and she pushes him out of the bathrooms and back into the main restaurant. Within seconds he’s on top of her, violently scratching at him. 

“Paws not claws, paws not claws! Hey! Ow! Oh god, you’re strong.” He groans. “This is exactly the sort of unprofessionalism I’m talking about!”

“You want to talk about professionalism?!”

“Yes, I do.” He hesitates. “But not here.”

* * *

They shiver in the freezer.

“This is exactly the sort of bullshit I’m talking about,” he says, avoiding eye contact with her. “You get pissed because I respect my  _ husband’s  _ opinion?”

“You  _ never  _ respect my opinion.”

“You’re not my husband!” He groans. “This is what I mean. You’ve got this  _ ridiculous  _ idea that just because you’re in love with me and you can’t get over it --  _ don’t  _ try to say you don’t, it’s obvious -- that you must be a huge part of my life as well! You’re  _ not,  _ okay? You’re not the  _ best thing that ever happened  _ to me, or the worst thing that ever happened, or  _ anything.  _ You’re just … a thing that happened. So you can stop waiting for something to happen to Herb so you can ask me out.”

Princess Carolyn looks at the ground, visibly embarrassed, but she’s just as quickly back on her feet. “What’s so  _ special  _ about Herb, anyway?”

“Um, he’s my  _ husband?” _

“He wasn’t always. You’re trying to make me feel like I should just  _ give up,  _ because I  _ never  _ had a chance, but I  _ did!  _ You’re bi, you knew me before you started dating him, you could have chosen me -- but you chose  _ him.  _ You know why? Because you think being gay is  _ special!” _

“Is it any wonder I don’t want to be around you?” he asks, each breath leaving a wisp of visible white air from the cold. “All you do is tell me I’m a terrible person.”

“Please,” she scoffs. “You’re such a self-pitying masochist, I could say ten nice things and one mean thing, and you would only hear the mean thing.”

“I’d love it if you said ten nice things to me!”

“I can say nice things.”

“Ready when you are! Does self-pitying masochist count, or are we starting from scratch?”

“Okay, one -- I’m freezing my whiskers off -- you have a natural charisma.”

“You hesitated,” he says dismissively. “That means it’s a lie.”

She elects to ignore this. “Two, you are loved by millions.”

“That’s not a compliment. So is Kim Jong Un and Teri Hatcher.”

She can tell this is going to be a long ten sentences.

* * *

“Number six -- you know how to make me laugh.”

He scoffs. “So I’m a clown to you?”

She groans, placing a hand to her forehead. “You recognize you’re being impossible, right?”

BoJack sighs, staring down at his shoes. “I don’t know how you put up with me.”

“I didn’t put up with you, BoJack,” says Princess Carolyn. “I  _ liked  _ being your friend. And I don’t regret it.”

“Yeah, because you had a crush on me.”

Normally, this is the point where Princess Carolyn desperately tries to detach herself from her more childish emotions and insist that she never had feelings for him. Instead, she mumbles meekly, “Have.”

“Huh?”

“Have. I still do.” She sighs. “Tell me, did you ever love me? At all?”

“No. Why would I?” He shakes his head. “You think my life revolves around you as much as yours does around me, but it doesn’t. First you were just my agent’s assistant, then you were just my agent, and now you’re nothing.”

She looks down at the ground. “Why do I do this to myself?”

“I don’t know. Maybe if you’re good at putting out fires, you just run from fire to fire without really thinking about --”

They’re interrupted by the door flying open and the chef, who is on fire, screaming.

With a sigh, BoJack figures that, since he technically owns the restaurant -- he bought it when he was drunk in an attempt to impress Herb -- he ought to help them. The chef explains that most of the guests have left, but the critic remains, and she still wants her mushroom risotto.

“I don’t know how to make mushroom risotto!” he says, throwing up his hands in frustration.

“I know how.”

He turns at the voice, but immediately dismisses Princess Carolyn. “No, go home.”

She sighs. “You’re right.

She exits swiftly, while he struggles to figure it out.

* * *

She starts the drive home and turns the radio on.

_ “Keep driving, keep driving, _

_ Girl, don’t turn that car around _

_ Break your pattern of needing to fix other people, _

_ Just keep on driving away…” _

“Ugh,” she groans. “Who do they write these songs for?”

_ “Don’t go back to the restaurant, Princess Carolyn _

_ Just keep driving away.” _

“...Ugh.”

The music stops. Tires screech on the road.

“God dammit.”

* * *

His saviour comes in and says the word, “Olive,”, and that’s what saves the restaurant.

Not that he’s grateful, of course. “What are you doing?”

“Let me do this,” she insists, taking over on the mushroom risotto. “You’ll burn the place to the ground.”

He sighs. “Fine. This isn’t one of those things where you save my ass so I feel obligated to give you your job back.”

“I know you have no sense of obligation to me.”

She continues to make the mushroom risotto, while he watches. “How do you know how to do this?”

“Mom was a live-in maid for a rich family,” she explains. “She had a little trouble bending her elbow too much. So unless I wanted us to be on the street, I had to cover for her, a lot. That rich family loved Italian food and champagne fountains.”

“How come you never told me that?” asks BoJack.

“I did.”

Guilt washes over him. “Oh.”

“It’s okay,” says Princess Carolyn, in a tone that clearly implies that it’s not okay. “I know you never remember anything.”

“That’s not true,” he protests. “I remember the first time we met. I went to see Marv. You were at the desk in front of his office. You said, ‘It’s good to see you again’ … Oh. So I guess we’d met before.”

She tsks. “That was the  _ third  _ time we met. The first time was when I was an intern. I delivered a script to your house. You were passed out in the yard, covered in tapioca pudding. I hosed you down, dragged you inside, covered you with a blanket.”

“Really? I don’t remember that.”

“Shocker.”

A smile crosses BoJack’s face. “So you’ve gone from daughter of a maid to head of your own company.”

She sighs. “Well, the company’s not doing so hot.”

“Don’t try to guilt me,” he says sternly, and they finish the risotto together.

They give it to the critic, who compliments the food but is less than happy with the ambience -- the restaurant’s owner and his ex-agent were screaming all night, and a waiter ran through the restaurant on fire at one point. She promises to give them a low rating on her blog,  _ samanthagoestorestaurants.tumblr.com.  _

She leaves and the waiter who was on fire goes to the ER for his burns, leaving them alone in the restaurant.

“What's the second time we met?” asks BoJack.

“A taping of  _ Horsin' Around.” _

“Which episode?” 

“The one where Olivia put too much detergent in the washing machine.”

“Nancy Reagan was the guest star. That woman was the real actor in the family.”

“I just started working for Marv,” explains Princess Carolyn. “I went backstage to introduce myself.”

“And then what happened?” 

“You told me you were too tired pretending to be nice all night, and I needed to leave you alone.”

“Oh.” His face falls. “I'm a real jerk, huh?” 

“Yeah, but you're honest, straightforward, not fake nice and don't beat around the bush. Your heart is tender, so you protect it from people, but sometimes you open up a wall and it's incredible. You're doing the best you can, considering your asshole parents. You have great taste in art, and that pink spot on your nose is just adorable.” She pauses. “How many nice things was that, about ten?” 

He grins. “Yeah, just about.”

“Okay, one more. You let me help you tonight because you knew I needed it. You did it for me, which was very sweet.”

“Thanks. You're a good friend to me.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“BoJack?”

“Yeah?”

“Are we friends?”

“...Yeah. ...I mean, I think we are. Or I think we can be.”

She takes a deep breath. “Okay, then as a friend, I'm asking you:  _ Please  _ don't leave me.”

“Princess Carolyn --” he interrupts, but she cuts him off once again.

“I can turn this around, I just need more time. We're in a fragile period, still finding our feet. Just give me six months and then you can go. I promise, I'll never ask anything from you again, but please, give me six months.”

The waiter chooses that moment to come in to grab his coat, which he left behind. Once he’s gone, Princess Carolyn starts again with the request.    
“So? What do you think?”

BoJack takes a deep breath.

“No.”


	9. What Else Is There To Say?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack gets nominated for an Oscar. This, like everything else in his life, sends him into a spiral.

It’s approximately thirty-six long, painful minutes before he finally makes the announcement they’ve been waiting for. They’re clinging to Mr. Peanutbutter’s every word, at the edge of their seats, as he finally tells them the nominations.

“For Best Actor, the nominees are: Jurj Clooners from  _ The Nazi Who Played Yahtzee,  _ Bread Poot for  _ City of AIDS,  _ Colin Firth for  _ First Things First: The Colin Firth Story,  _ Michael Fassbender for … I want to say Bill Gates? And BoJack Horseman for  _ Secretariat.” _

You could hear a pin drop in the silence that follows. “Whoa,” says BoJack. There’s not much else to say.

“BoJack!” exclaims Herb, practically overflowing with pride and excitement. “You just got nominated for an  _ Oscar!  _ You’re an  _ Oscar  _ nominee!” He slings an arm around his husband’s shoulders. “How do you feel?”

“I feel,” he begins, struggling to find words. “I feel…” His face falls. “The same.”

Herb frowns. “What do you mean?”

BoJack groans. “Why do I keep thinking things will make me happy? What is  _ wrong  _ with me?”

“BJ, listen to me. It’s going to be okay --”

“Oh God, I’m crashing,” he continues. “I feel like I’m crashing.”

“BJ, it’s okay. Listen. Back in the 90s, I made a very famous TV show.”

“I know,” interrupts BoJack. “I was the lead actor, I was there. I know everything that happened.”

“Not from my perspective,” insists Herb. “I knew that my career was doomed if anyone found out I was gay, so I tried to keep it a secret. But eventually I got tired of hiding myself and I got sloppy, and --”

“You got caught sucking dick in a public bathroom and arrested for public indecency?”

Herb sighs. “Yes, that is what happened. When I saw that the story was on the news, I thought I was a goner for sure -- Angela would fire me and I’d never get another chance to work in the industry again. But when I was in trouble, I learned that the people around me would stand up for me.”

“I already know that story.”

He places a hand on BoJack’s knee. “BJ, when you find yourself lost and disoriented and you don’t know what’s going to happen next, it’s important to remember that there are people who have your back.”

“I don’t deserve this,” insists BoJack. “I’m not a best actor.”

“You are to me,” says Herb. “Besides, you just got nominated for an  _ Oscar!  _ We’ve gotta party.”

* * *

And party they do.

They party like it’s 1982, the year that Prince released  _ 1999\.  _ They party to make up for their lack of New Year party and then some -- they didn’t get a chance to properly celebrate the start of 2016, the year which it currently is, since they were so busy dealing with Princess Carolyn trying to get BoJack two different movies, neither of which he got. They demand that his free Tesla is parked rather inconveniently in the middle of his living room. Diane visits.

This is odd, because Diane doesn’t visit during parties.

“Hi,” she says meekly.

“You get a load of this chili cheese fountain?” asks BoJack. “Grab a handful of beans and go to town.”

“Hey, this is all really something,” she explains. “But I actually just came because I heard about the nomination and I wanted to make sure you're okay.”

“That's a funny way of saying congratulations,” he scoffs. “But not funny ‘ha-ha’, more like funny Doonesbury.”

“I know how this kind of thing can sometimes send you spinning. _ ‘Oh, God, why doesn't this make me happy? Will anything make me happy? I'm an empty husk.’  _ That kind of thing.”

“Well,  _ thank you  _ for that,” he says sarcastically, “but I'm actually doing great. I direct your attention to the aforementioned chili cheese fountain!”

She sighs. “It's too bad I'm not managing your social campaign anymore, because this party would make a great Snapchat story.”

“You are not gonna make me guilty about leaving Princess Carolyn.”

“I'm not here to make you feel guilty. Like I said --”

“Honestly,” he interrupts. “I don't even know what you're doing over there.”

“Tweeting for celebrities?”

He groans. “When I met you, you were so cool and interesting.”

She raises an eyebrow. “Uh, I was never cool.”

“You used to actually care about shit. What happened?”

"I don't know, BoJack. Maybe caring about shit got old. Maybe I'm tired of everyone yelling at me and sending death threats to my house, and all my friends thinking I'm annoying, and getting in fights with my husband, and seeing little refugee boys die in hospital bombings. It's exhausting and I can't do it. If that makes me a bad person, then I'm sorry that I'm not the  _ cool, interesting girl.” _

He frowns. “I never said you were a bad person. I just said it's not you. And you  _ know  _ it's not you.”

“Oh, and this party  _ is  _ you? Who are all these people?”

“These are my friends!” he says defensively.

“Name one of them.”

He hesitates, looking at the Tesla in the middle of his living room. “...Tes-ley.”

“You're just looking at the Tesla.”

“I don't know why it's so hard for you to believe that I could be happy. I'm not like you, okay? I don’t feel the need to  _ fetishize  _ my own sadness.”

Diane’s eyes widen. “I don't fetishize my own sadness.”

_ “Sure.” _

She glares. “You don't know anything about me.”

“I know that you can tweet for a living in a house in Beverly Hills that your husband bought, or you can think you're better than everyone, but you can't do both.”

“I don't think I'm better than everyone.” she mutters defensively.

“And again, I say,  _ sure.” _

Anger at an absolute peak, she sighs aloud. “You know what's gonna happen? You're gonna win that  _ Oscar _ , and you're gonna go up on that stage and give your little speech, and then you're gonna go home. And you're gonna be so miserable, you'll want to kill yourself. And you're gonna have nobody left to stop you.”

Herb’s meek defense of,  _ “I’m  _ going to stop him,” falls on deaf ears as she stomps off. BoJack, however, takes notice of it. He frantically gestures toward Herb. 

“See!” he yells, as though trying to win some ridiculous argument. “Herb’s going to be around when I kill myself!”

_ “If  _ you kill yourself,” corrects Herb.

“Eh, you say tomato, I say tomato.”

“You say that like you’re planning to --”

“Come  _ on,  _ Herb, I just got nominated for an  _ Oscar!”  _ He takes a swig of a clear liquid that probably isn’t water. “You were the one that suggested we party, stop killing the fun!”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “It’s kinda hard to party when there’s an inconveniently large Tesla in the middle of the living room.”

“Fine, I’ll drive it outside.”

He marches over to his Tesla. He runs a hand over it, admiring the yellow paint, and pulls the door open. He sits down in the driver’s seat. He adjusts the mirror, planning to reverse outside and park it just outside his pool -- he can take it to the driveway later. Instead he drives forward and hits a wall.

“Shit!” he yells. There’s not much else to say.

He reverses out of the wall and decides to take a short break from driving. “You okay?” asks Herb.

“I mean, I didn’t break several ribs, lose one of my oldest friends, and almost kill three teenagers, so I’d say I’m doing pretty good.” He glances around the room. “Hey, Mr. Peanutbutter!”

He runs over to the dog to give him a big friendly pat on the back. “When you said my name this morning, you  _ changed my life.” _

“About that --” begins Mr. Peanutbutter uneasily, but BoJack cuts him off.

“Hey, did you see Erica here? She was looking for you earlier, with her good eye. Her other eye was looking to the stars.”

Mr. Peanutbutter sighs. “BoJack, I need to talk to you.” 

“Yeah? What’s going on, buddy?”

“...Well, I’ve got good news and bad news.”

He proceeds to tell BoJack, in unnecessary detail, the story of how he was late to announce the  _ Oscar  _ nominees because his sick brother called, and he had to engage in some whacky sitcom hijinks to answer the phone, and then he was even more late because he lost the paper with the nominees at some point during the whacky sitcom hijinks and had to make them up on the spot.

“So,” he summarises. “The good news is, my brother's surgery was a success. And the bad news is, you're not nominated for an Oscar. And the other good news is that each breath is a gift and it is a joy to live.”

BoJack gives him a blank stare. “What?”

“We are so lucky we get to be alive.”

“No, before that.”

“Oh, I didn't tell you,” he explains. “My brother's been sick.”

“No, I don't care about your brother.”

“First of all, manners. Second of all, I think if you met him, you'd actually really hit it off. Imagine me but with less  _ in-your-face _ cool guy attitude.”

You can tell something’s wrong, because he neglects to correct Mr. Peanutbutter on the fact that his attitude is not that of a “cool guy”. “ Did you say I'm not nominated for an Oscar?”

“Oh,” says Mr. Peanutbutter dismissively. “A lot of people are mighty steamed, but I feel like what everyone's overlooking here is, I got most of the categories dead-on. That's pretty amazing, and I am not getting enough credit for that. Did you know that  _ Avatar  _ came out in 2009?”

BoJack continues to look ahead with the same blank stare. “I'm not nominated for an Oscar.”

“No. But you know what they say.  _ ‘It's an honor just to be nominated.’ _ Oh, wait.”

His face falls. “So, I'm just like everybody else.”

“I know you're upset, but whatever you do,  _ please  _ don't get mad at Todd.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Why would I get mad at Todd?”

“Exactly. This is totally my fault. He didn't even want to nominate you.”

“...What?”

Mr. Peanutbutter grimaces apologetically. “With the gift of hindsight, I see now how that might

have made you even more upset. But I realized something today, when my brother called from the hospital, and I think it's gonna make you feel a lot better.”

“What?” asks BoJack anxiously, desperate for any scrap of happiness. “What is it?”

“None of this matters.”

* * *

It’s late in the evening when Todd finally comes home. “Hey! Todd! Where you been?”

Todd glares at him. “Oh, hi.”

“You were in Ojai?”

“No,” he answers flatly. “I was just saying hi.”

“Well, why not go to Ojai, huh? You and me? I could use an escape, couldn't you?”

“It's not really a good time.”

BoJack sighs. “Todd, I need this. You're my best friend and I need you. Don't leave me now. Don't be like everybody else.”

“I'm not leaving you,” insists Todd. “I just --”

“Besides,” says BoJack accusingly. “I think you owe me, right? After what you did?”

“What I  _ did?” _

“Come on, Todd. I know. Mr. Peanutbutter told me everything.”

“Everything?” His jaw drops comically. “Even told you, when I was a kid, I used to bang on my butt like a bongo drum when I got out of the bath?”

“What?” chokes BoJack. “Mm, no, not -- not about that.”

“So, he didn't tell you everything.” He thinks for a moment. “Did he tell you about the time I counted to a million?

BoJack groans. “He told me you didn't want to nominate me for an Oscar.

Todd’s expression hardens. “Oh, that.”

“What the hell, man? After everything I've done for you?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Oh, I don't know. Letting you live here for free for  _ six years?  _ Giving you food, indulging you in your little projects and adventures and stories about how you used to bang on your butt like a bongo drum? I let you turn my house into your company's headquarters for the last _ month!” _

“Yeah,” counters Todd. “but that's not because you're my friend. That’s because you felt bad about Emily.”

BoJack’s heart skips a beat. “You know about Emily?”

“I mean, I think I know. Why, what do you think I know? I mean, I know what I think, but I don't know if the thing that I think is the thing that you think I know, you know?”

BoJack decides to bite the bullet. “So, you know I yelled at Emily and called her a cunt.”

Todd’s face falls and he glares at BoJack with utter disgust. “You called Emily a cunt?!”

“Well, what did you think?”

“I don't know!” Todd chokes. “Not that! I just knew  _ something  _ sketchy happened. I thought maybe you gave her one of your _ weird monologues _ about how  _ sad  _ you are, and it bummed her out!”

BoJack takes a deep breath and scrambles to apologise. “Todd, I'm sorry, all right? I screwed up. I know I screwed up. I don't know why --”

“Oh, great! Of course!” Todd throws up his hands in frustration. “Here it comes!  _ You can't keep doing this!  _ You can't keep doing shitty things, and then feel bad about yourself like that makes it okay! You need to be better!”

“I know,” says BoJack weakly. “And I'm sorry, okay? I was drunk, and there was all this pressure with the Oscar campaign. But now -- Now that it's over, I --”

“No!” His voice rises to a shout. He’s angrier than BoJack’s ever seen him. “No, BoJack, just  _ stop _ . You are  _ all the things _ that are wrong with you. It's not the alcohol, or the drugs, or any of the shitty things that happened to you in your career, or when you were a kid. It's  _ you.  _ All right?  _ It’s you.”  _

There’s a long, painful silence.

_ “Fuck,  _ man. What else is there to say?”

* * *

The words, “Clean up your shit, Todd!” might as well have been his catchphrase for the past six years. But when Todd finally  _ is  _ cleaning up his shit, shoving it all into a bag with no regard for organisation, it gives him nothing but pain.  _ This is real. This is really happening. He’s leaving.  _

_ This is your fault. _

Herb, of course, takes this moment to walk into the room. “Bye, Herb,” says Todd, with fake cheeriness. “I guess I’ll see you around.”

He says no such thing to BoJack.

Herb stares in confusion as Todd leaves and slams the door behind him. “Holy shit, I thought I heard you two arguing earlier, but I didn’t think you would kick him out.”

“I didn’t!” says BoJack defensively. “He just … We had a fight, that’s all.”

_ “That’s all?  _ He’s literally moving out  _ right now.” _

“Yeah, well, I guess he’s pissed.”

Herb sighs. “What did you do?”

There’s a long, painful pause.

“...Remember Emily?”

“...Yeah,” says Herb apprehensively.

“I had a fight with her a while back, that’s all. I … kind of lost my temper, and I yelled at her.” He takes a deep breath. “I shouldn’t have yelled at her. There was no excuse for that. Anyway, Todd apparently found out about it, and then he got really angry at me.”

Herb pauses.

“So, do you really think that if you keep being vague I’m not going to ask what the fight with Emily was about, or … ?”

BoJack sighs. “Long story short, she started ranting about how  _ unfair  _ it was that Todd wouldn’t have sex with her. You know, acting all entitled and not respecting when he said no. And also she asked me to cheat on you with her, which was … weird. After a while I blew up at her and called her a cunt. And a piece of shit.”

There’s a long, awkward silence.

Herb finally puts a hand on BoJack’s shoulder. “Obviously, you shouldn’t have yelled at her.” He clears his throat. “Honestly, I can see why Todd moved out. You … have been pretty rude to him over the years. Not to mention that time you sabotaged his rock opera.”

“God, I keep screwing up.” He groans. “Shit. I feel so alone right now.”

“Listen, BJ,” says Herb gently. “It sucks that Todd’s upset with you and that you had to fire Princess Carolyn. But I want you to remember that no matter how hard it gets, you’ll always have me.” He smiles. “I always said to you and the kids, back when we worked on  _ Horsin’ Around,  _ that we were a  _ family.  _ And family means that we  _ stick together,  _ no matter what.”

BoJack’s eyes light up. “You’re right.  _ Horsin’ Around  _ is my family. I need my family right now.”

“And that’s why I’m always here if you need someone to -- oh.”

He watches in mild horror as BoJack takes out his phone and scrolls through his contacts. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

“Trust me, Herb, I know what I need right now.”

Herb begins a stuttering objection, but he can’t find the words. He’s powerless to do anything as BoJack presses the call button and holds the phone to his ear.

“Hey, Sarah Lynn. Wanna party?”


	10. Suck A Dick, Dumb Shits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack and Sarah Lynn go on a bender together.

The next thing he knows, he’s halfway through a rant about how rectangular buildings are objectively superior.

He blinks several times, staring at Sarah Lynn. “Wait, what were we talking about?”

“We were talking about _Horsin’ Around,”_ explains Sarah Lynn. “Then you had to go pee. Then you came back covered in toilet paper and pretended to be a mummy. Then you took it all off because you decided Egypt was stupid, especially pyramids, because you think triangle buildings are -- and I quote -- ‘gauche as shit’.”

BoJack frowns. “That _does_ sound like me, but I don’t remember any of that.” He checks his phone -- his sole notification is a missed call from Herb, and it’s some two hours later than he thought it was. “I must have blacked out. Maybe I should lay off the alcohol for a while.”

He does no such thing.

* * *

Several blackouts later, he comes to his senses as he’s watching some annoying bird guy talk about how he was _stuck in a terrifying cycle of drinking, lifting his head up, drinking, lifting his head up._

He looks around, trying to get a handle on his surroundings. “Coffee, stale donuts, attention hogs telling boring stories about themselves?” His eyes widen. “Jesus! Are we at a 12-step Meeting?”

“Now, you're a detective?” Sarah Lynn raises an eyebrow. “Last night, you couldn't even solve the mystery of where the toilet is.”

His heart skips a beat. “So, all our partying was an elaborate trick just to get me to go sober?”

“No, Detective Pukes in the Washing Machine. You're here because I couldn't leave you alone in my house, and I had to come today. Gotta get my nine-month chip.”

“Chip? We've been wasted for…” He takes out his phone, ignoring his several missed calls from Herb, and his eyes widen as he checks the time. “...31 hours?”

“That's no reason for me to not get my chip.”

“That's literally _exactly_ the reason you shouldn't get your chip."

"Nowhere in the 12 steps does it say to not drink. That's not actually one of the steps. Loophole.” She hands him a bottle. “Take a swig. If you have to listen to losers talk about their shitty sober lives, it's a lot more fun to be buzzed.”

“And I realized people don't change because they want to change,” finishes the annoying bird dramatically. “They change because they have to change.”

The next speaker comes to the stage. “My name is Simon and I'm an alcoholic.”

The room erupts into a chorus of, “Hi, Simon.”

“My rock bottom was when I actually woke up under a rock. Can't get lower than that.”

“Don’t worry,” insists Sarah Lynn. “We’re just getting my chip and then getting out of here.”

BoJack hesitates. “...Actually, I think maybe we should stick around.”

Somehow, he sits through all the boring stories. Somehow he ends up on that stage.

“H-Hi,” he says unsteadily. “I'm not an alcoholic, but…” He stumbles around drunkenly and several people raise eyebrows. “But, it is _possible_ that I have a _slightly_ unhealthy relationship with alcohol. Name’s BoJack.”

“Hi, BoJack.” the audience choruses.

“My, uh, rock bottom, I guess,” he continues uneasily. “was when my husband was diagnosed with cancer.” He pauses. “Well, I don't know that it was my _rock_ bottom. I mean, those few years were the _worst_ , I was sure he would die, but…” He hesitates. “I guess my _real_ rick bottom was when I sabotaged my roommate’s project so he wouldn't move out. ...No, that was _nothing.”_ He takes another swig of his drink. Pauses. “Okay, you know what? All of you, shut the hell up.”

You could hear a pin drop in the silence that follows.

“I'm _so_ sick of all your _bullshit_ stories about how you couldn't get something done because you were _too drunk,_ okay? Nobody _cares_ that you were always too drunk to buy a goddamn painting. Let me tell you a _real_ story: My old car had dodgy brakes, and I never got around to fixing them because I was _too drunk,_ the usual story. One day I went to visit an old friend, and she had a daughter, Penny. Penny Carson. That's a real name, you can look her up. I said the car was OK, and Penny crashed it. She almost died. Then her mom found out, and I was like, ‘Oopsie-doopsie! Exit stage right!’ Oh, God.” He groans. “The worst part is, I don't even know what happened after I left. Did I ruin the family? Did I scar that little girl for life? I don't know. I'll never know. And that's just, like, one of a billion things that I have going through my head all the time. So, anyone got a better story than that?” 

There's a long, painful silence.

“Didn't think so, bitches. Where's my trophy, or chip, or whatever?”

* * *

And that, in a nutshell, is how the AA meeting gets cancelled.

“What did I do again?” asks BoJack as he drives on, narrowly avoiding killing several people. Maybe he shouldn’t have declined Herb’s offer to be the designated driver.

“You told everyone about that Penny chick,” explains Sarah Lynn. “Then you went on and on about how you’re never going to change. Then you chased the slug around threatening to pour salt on his head.”

His heart skips a beat. “I talked about Penny?”

“Hey, we’ve all done bad things before.” She pauses. “Most of us aren’t as proud of it as you seem to be.”

“I'm not proud,” he insists. “I feel really terrible that I might have really messed that girl up.”

“Oh, she's fine,” says Sarah Lynn dismissively. “I looked her up on Facebook. She's going to Oberlin, likes Thai food and the smell of a fire on the first really cold day of winter.”

“That doesn't mean anything. Everyone likes the smell of fire on the first cold day of winter.”

Sarah Lynn sighs. “You know, I used to feel just like you before I got into this ‘12 steps’ thing. They taught me how to make amends. You just say you're sorry for the things you did and you get a clean slate.”

“So, what? You just dirty up the slate again.”

“Then, you just make amends again. It's a never-ending cycle, where you always end up feeling good about yourself.”

They’re interrupted by an annoying instrumental version of the _Horsin’ Around_ theme.

“That’s still your ringtone?” says Sarah Lynn with a raised eyebrow.

BoJack ignores her. “Shit, it’s Herb.”

“Yeah, you should probably take it. I think he called, like, ten times? But you were too drunk and high to answer. So, like, he’s probably on the verge of reporting you missing.”

He answers the phone.

“BJ!” yells Herb. “Thank God, I was about to call the police! Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” answers BoJack drunkenly. “I’m still with Sarah Lynn. I just want you to know that, like, uh, I’m sorry for every shitty thing I did. Ever.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“...BJ?” asks Herb anxiously. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Are you sure? Because after that fight you had with Diane the other day and now you’re randomly apologising and --”

“I went to an AA meeting.”

He hears Herb spit out his drink.

_“What?!”_

“Calm your tits, I’m not an alcoholic. I kinda ruined the meeting by bumming everyone out, so now I’m learning to make amends for the shitty things I’ve done!” He grins. “So, like, do I get a clean slate or what?”

There’s a long pause.

“Uh, yeah, BJ. Clean slate. Call me back later, okay?”

“I will.”

They go off to make amends.

* * *

They don’t do a good job.

They start by breaking into Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter’s house to apologise to them. When neither are home, they steal their clothes to apologise to them in a bizarre roleplay. Diane gets home and calls Herb so that he can pick them up, and they run off before he arrives.

Then they decide to apologise to Todd, and instead apologise to a complete stranger who vaguely resembles him. Herb once again attempts to take them home, but they insist that he would be _spoiling the fun_ if he did so, so he reluctantly agrees to let them continue for another day.

The next day, he calls them again asks them to come home, and Sarah Lynn steals BoJack’s phone and yells, “Suck a dick, dumb shits!” before hanging up. 

The rest of Herb’s calls are more focused on ensuring that they’re still alive. BoJack ignores his ringing phone as he drunkenly yells his apologies to Princess Carolyn. It’s several weeks into the bender when Herb once again demands that they go home. BoJack, out of spite, goes to Ohio.

“Wait, shit, Ohio?” asks BoJack.

“Yeah, we drove here,” explains Sarah Lynn. “I wanted to go to the Planetarium, but no, you had to apologise to that Penny girl.”

BoJack’s heart skips a beat. “We can’t go there. We’ve gotta turn around.”

He does no such thing.

* * *

The next thing he knows, he’s weirdly observing Penny from a pile of bushes.

“She seems fine,” he says, in an attempt at a detective’s voice. “Too fine, like she's hiding a dark secret that's eating away at her soul.” He pauses. “Or, possibly she's fine. Maybe I didn't ruin her life.”

“Hey, you were an older man who didn’t do enough to protect me, and I turned out fine.” Somehow Sarah Lynn isn’t being as reassuring as she’d like to be. “Now, can we please go home?”

“Okay, good plan. I'll just go pee out the last 20 beers.” He stands up and immediately has to grip a wall to avoid falling. “Whoa.” He staggers forward. “Look at me, walking good.”

And then, she sees him.

She freezes on the spot. Blood drains from her face. She stares at him with those wide, vulnerable eyes. Deer in the headlights. “B-BoJack?” she stutters weakly.

“Oh,” attempts BoJack, trying to defend himself. “I --”

“What are you doing here?” She takes a step backwards. “Did you come her to find me?”

“No, I --” he tries, but he can’t finish the sentence. 

She finally starts to assert herself. “You can't be here. I-I don't want to see you here. I don't want to see you at all. I-I trusted you, you could have stopped it, I could have _died --”_

“I’m sorry,” he says weakly.

“You need to leave.”

Someone recognizes them as the actors from _Horsin’ Around,_ and they run back to the car before they can get caught up in the crowd. The last glimpse they see of Penny is of her terrified, clutching the strap of her bag like a lifeline, backing away in fear.

He caused that.

“You know,” says Sarah Lynn on the drive home. “on the plus side, she really seemed okay.”

“Mm-hmm,” says BoJack.

“Until she saw you and freaked out.”

BoJack groans.

“But she probably would have been totally fine if you'd never shown up,” she continues.

“Oh, God.”

“I think the wound was completely healed before you reopened it by showing up unannounced at her college and all the pain came rushing back to her.

He throws up his hands in frustration. “Oh, good Lord!”

“In a way, it's like you destroyed her life twice.”

“Will you please stop talking about it?”

“Okay, fine. Whoop.” She shivers. “Man, Ohio sucks! Next time, could you almost kill someone who lives in Hawaii? You could be bummed out at a luau right now.”

He sighs. “Let's just go home.”

She struggles to open a large bottle of something that isn’t water. “You got a bottle opener?”

“Glove compartment.”

She opens the glove compartment and her eyes widen. “Well, I'll be a dick sucked by a dumbshit!” She holds up a small packet with a crudely drawn picture of a green horse with blue hair and swirly eyes on the front, containing white powder. “What do we have here?”

“Oh, that?” His mind flicks back to the bizarre adventure with Diane that lead to him obtaining it. “Turns out there's a brand of heroin called BoJack.”

Sarah Lynn is practically overflowing with excitement. “Dude, that's a big freaking deal. Getting a drug named after you is cooler than getting an Oscar. I mean,” she starts counting on her fingers, “there's Billy Crystal Meth, Angel Dustin Hoffman, Lucille Eightball and now you. It's a rarefied breed, man. Congratulations!”

“Thank you?”

“Oh, we _have_ to do BoJack! It’s too perfect!”

“I don’t know,” says BoJack uneasily. “There’s that old saying. ‘Liquor before beer, never fear. Don’t do heroin.’”

Sarah Lynn does a funny voice and bobs the heroin up and down like a child playing with toys. _“I’m BoJack. Please, put me inside you.”_

“I’m not gonna shoot heroin with you, Sarah Lynn.”

And he’s right.

They’re going to snort heroin together, like sophisticated adults.

* * *

He comes to some time later on his couch.

“Wha... ?”

“Suck a dick, dumb shit,” says Sarah Lynn helpfully.

He glances around the room, blinking rapidly. “How’d I get home?”

“You freaked out being a dumbass and ruined the party,” explains Sarah Lynn.  
“...Wha… ?”

He feels a gentle hand on his shoulder. Upon turning, he sees Herb behind him. “I called you a couple hours ago and you were panicking, so I got Diane to give me a lift to Sarah Lynn’s place and I took you home.”

“Ugh.” He places a hand to his forehead and turns to Sarah Lynn. “What are you doing here?”

“Herb made me come so I wouldn’t take anything else, ugh. He is _so_ boring.”

“I’m standing right here,” says Herb defensively.

Sarah Lynn’s response comes as a mush of sound and BoJack feels his eyelids drooping again. He lets himself lie back down on the couch, and everything goes dark.

* * *

The next thing he knows, he’s being rather rudely shaken awake.

“BoJack!” She’s jumping up and down and squealing with excitement and frantically gesturing toward the TV. “I just won an _Oscar!”_

BoJack rubs his sleepy eyes. “The _Oscars_ are on TV?” His eyes widen and suddenly he’s wide awake. “Shit, how long were we on that bender?”

Sarah Lynn ignores him, eagerly watching the TV screen. A bear man that is unfamiliar to him takes the award. “I accept this on her behalf,” he says, in a heavy bear accent. He turns to the screen. “And if you’re watching this, Sarah Lynn, wherever you are … Please come home.”

In an instant, Sarah Lynn’s face falls. She lets herself slide down the couch until she’s sitting on her knees on the floor. She sighs aloud. “Oh man, I should have been there.” She turns to look at BoJack with wide, vulnerable eyes. “When I was a kid, if you’d told me I’d win an _Oscar,_ I’d never have believed it. And now I’ve done it and…”

The rest of her sentence dissolves in her mouth and she looks like she’s been punched in the gut. “...BoJack, I don’t like anything about me.”

BoJack’s heart skips a beat. “Hey --” he begins, placing a hand on her shoulder, but she flinches away.

“None of this is me,” she says, staring at the ground. “These boobs aren’t me, this house isn’t me --”

“We’re not at your house right now.”

She ignores him. “The only reason I wear this shirt is because some company paid me eight thousand dollars to wear it. And I don’t even need the money!” She forces a chuckle. “I just liked that someone still wanted me to wear their shirt…”

“Hey, hey, hey,” says BoJack hurriedly, waving his hands to bring her train of thought to a close. “It’s okay. Everything’s gonna be okay.”

His words fall on deaf ears as she continues to spiral. “What am I supposed to do? I don’t know what to do.” She looks back up at him. “Am I doomed? Are you doomed? Are we all doomed?”

“No, no!” he insists. “Calm down. Nobody is doomed. And I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do.” He smiles. “We’re gonna go to the planetarium.”

* * *

All in all, it’s quite a beautiful scene. Sarah Lynn’s frail, skinny body lying against BoJack’s fur, her brown hair tangled and matted from the bender, her makeup smeared all over her face, and yet somehow, in her half-asleep state, more peaceful than she’s ever been seen before; BoJack, holding her close to his body, giving the illusion of some kind of strength despite being incredibly unfit; both of them, silhouetted against the swirling galaxies of the planetarium, stars piercing the darkness.

She yawns and sleepily raises a hand to rub her eyes. “I wanna be an architect.”

The narrator continues to drone on.

_“...be it horse, cat, human, or even lizard, our lives are but the briefest flashes in a universe that is billions of years old.”_

“See, Sarah Lynn,” says BoJack, pointing to the constellations that are appearing and just as quickly fading in the sky above them, depicting glowing representations of a horse, a cat, a human, and a lizard. “We’re not doomed. In the grand scheme of things, we’re just tiny specks that will one day be forgotten. So, it doesn’t matter what we did in the past, or how we’ll be remembered. The only thing that matters is right now, this moment, this one _spectacular_ moment we are sharing together. Right, Sarah Lynn?”

Sarah Lynn remains silent.

“Sarah Lynn?”

His quick nudge to her ribs produces no response.

“...Sarah Lynn?”

His heart skips several beats.

The first thing he thinks is that _shit,_ he’s _killed_ her. He took her on this bender when she was sober, and gave her the heroin, and took her to the planetarium when she was upset instead of just getting Herb to help calm her down, and now she’s _dead,_ and it’s his fault. This is it, it’s all over. His name will be all over the newspapers as the man who killed Sarah Lynn, he’ll be jailed for sure, Herb will leave him, Diane will never speak to him again, _it’s over._ He’s successfully ruined _everything_ in his life.

With shaking hands, he places two fingers under her neck, to check for a pulse. It’s a little hard to tell whether there is one -- he’s not completely free from the heroin’s influence himself, and everything’s a little hazy, and his hands are so shaky -- but when he can’t tell, he manages to place a hand on her sternum, and he feels the rise and fall of her chest. Her breaths are shallow, dangerously so, but they’re _there._ They prove that she’s alive.

She’s alive. He hasn’t _completely_ ruined everything yet. And in some horrible, twisted way, that’s _worse._

Because if she’s dead, then there’s nothing he can do. But now that she’s alive, there’s things he _can_ do to maximise her survival rate, and things that he’d better do _quickly_ if he wants to get her out of here alive. The problem is, those things require that he call the ambulance _right now,_ and that he’s upfront about the fact that she was taking heroin.

The police, of course, will ask where she got the heroin.

Of course, he could lie and say he doesn’t know -- but considering that they’ve been on a bender together for _weeks,_ that’ll be a bit hard to explain away. He could, then, lie about the bender, pretend it never happened -- except then he would have to explain why she was at his house in the first place to be driven to the planetarium, and they might interrogate Herb before they can get a chance to get their lies sorted. The next step, logically, is to lie and say she wasn’t in his house and that he found her at the planetarium, but why would he just _happen_ to be at the planetarium? He could say she called, and then the lie would fall apart; they’d check the phone records and find nothing.

Unless she _did_ call him.

His brain works at a million miles an hour as he thinks up a plan. Take her phone, now, while she’s unconscious, and use it to phone himself. Wait a few minutes in painful silence, then hang up and go outside, or maybe wait inside, so he can change the plan up at a moment’s notice if someone walks in. Come back in, pretend to find her, call an ambulance. Perfect plan. Except …

The phone call, in order to be at all realistic, would have to be at least two minutes long. The planetarium is fifteen minutes away from his house.

 _Seventeen minutes._ He’d have to wait for _seventeen minutes._ Some part of him knows that with how shallow her breathing is, those seventeen minutes may well kill her.

He shakes the thought away. He wouldn’t do it. Or … would he? He _could_ do it. But that would _kill_ Sarah Lynn. He can’t be a murderer, he can’t be. He’d rather just go to jail.

He shudders at the thought. He _can’t_ go to jail. He can’t be cooped up in those tiny cells, driving himself mad. Not to mention being alone, so alone, without even Herb by his side.

 _Herb._ Shit, _Herb._ If he’s honest about what happened -- about the fact that he took her to the planetarium where she died -- Herb may _never_ forgive him. But if he lies, Herb will see right through it, because he knows about the bender -- and if Sarah Lynn dies due to his inaction, Herb won’t forgive him.

There’s no option that won’t make Herb pissed. Of _course_ there isn’t -- he’s already screwed up too badly and now he has to face the consequences. 

At the very least, he gets to choose his consequence. Jail time, or the pain of Sarah Lynn’s death.

He takes a deep breath, stands up on shaking legs, and makes his decision.


	11. That's Enough, Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following Sarah Lynn's overdose, BoJack struggles to feel like he made the right decision.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> funny coincidence: this is arguably one of the angstier chapters in the fic and its also chapter 11! just like BJ canon lol.

He stares blankly at the screen.

“Adam Levine has tweeted his well wishes,” says the whale. “ _‘My thoughts and prayers go out to her. I’m hoping for a successful recovery. #GoodLuck #WatchTheVoiceSeason10.’_ Again, for those of us just joining us, actress and pop star Sarah Lynn is in a hypoxia-induced coma following a heroin overdose.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

Herb places a hand on BoJack’s knee. “You did the right thing,” he says gently.

BoJack waves a hand dismissively. “Yeah, after I did the _wrong_ thing, like, fifty times.” He tries to sound callous but it comes out as a croak. “I mean, I took her on a bender when she was sober, gave her the heroin, and took her to the planetarium, but _sure_ , I managed to get her to hospital in time for her to _not be dead yet,_ so it’s _fine.”_

“BJ, come on, you’re being _way_ too hard on yourself.” He slings an arm around BoJack’s shoulders. “Taking her to the planetarium wasn’t your brightest idea, but you were just trying to help her when she was upset, and you were still high yourself. And then when you called that ambulance, you _saved her life.”_

“She could still die, though. She could still die in hospital. And I’m not even getting in trouble for giving her the heroin. Stupid-ass Good Samaritan laws.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “...That’s a good thing?”

“Is it, though?”

“Well, _yeah,_ it is. Why would you _want_ to be in jail?”

“I don’t know. Why does anybody want anything?” He sighs. “...Can you promise you won’t hate me after I tell you this?”

Herb hesitates, because BoJack is _exactly_ the sort of person who would ask a question like that and immediately reveal something horrific, but he finally swallows his fear. “I promise.”

“I almost left her.” At Herb’s wide, shocked eyes, he elaborated. “In the planetarium, after she wasn’t responding and I checked that she was still alive, I had this _moment_ when all I could think about was not getting in jail. I realised that if I used her phone to call myself and then waited outside for fifteen minutes, I could tell the police that she just called me when she was there and I had no idea where she got the heroin, and they wouldn’t have been able to disprove it.”

There’s a long, painful silence, but Herb gulps. “But you _didn’t.”_ He finds himself smiling encouragingly. “You were scared of getting in trouble, but you called straight away anyway, because you were willing to risk it for Sarah Lynn. That’s what really matters.”

“That’s what I thought too, you know?” says BoJack uneasily. “I thought I was being all noble and brave and shit by sacrificing myself to save her. But then I found out I wouldn’t be getting in trouble anyway, and I realised it wasn’t some grand sacrifice, it was just basic decency, and then I just felt disgusted with myself for even _thinking_ of letting her die.”

“Why does everything have to be about sacrifice?” asks Herb. “Whether or not you had to risk your own happiness to save her, she’s still alive. And if you’d left her there, she’d be just as dead whether you were free or in jail.” He sighs. “BJ, does _every_ good thing you do have to be about whether you _really_ did the right thing for the right reasons? Can’t it ever just be that you saved Sarah Lynn’s life, and that was a good thing you did?”

BoJack doesn’t answer.

* * *

Meanwhile, Margo Martindale crashes her boat.

Specifically, she crashes it into a boat containing an absurd amount of spaghetti. In the ensuing chaos, an absurdly large amount of spaghetti is cooking and expanding in the ocean, threatening to crush an underwater city. “Well, Tom,” says one of the nation’s leading spaghetti scientists. “as the spaghetti cooks, it will expand, smothering the town and tenderly broiling the sea life who reside there.”

“Is there any way to prevent this delicious-sounding environmental catastrophe?” asks the news reporter.

“The only hope for rescue would be if someone had an enormous quantity of spaghetti strainers just sitting around the house, but that person would also need access to a fleet of drivers to transport said spaghetti strainers, and in order to strain the spaghetti fast enough, the drivers would also need to be incredibly strong swimmers, like, just as an example, hot, sexy killer whales.”

Todd watches the news. 

He watches it from the TV Mr. Peanutbutter and Diane’s house -- his series of bizarre sitcom-like schemes keep him too busy day-to-day to get a job, and his lack of income makes it basically impossible for him to buy a house, so he sort of plonks himself down on their couch day after day and hopes they don’t notice.

He looks at the news story, then at Diane. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

Diane grins. “I think I am.”

Todd’s eyes widen. “So you also think that the opposite of ‘whatever floats your boat’ is ‘whatever tips your ship’?!”

Diane does a double take. “What?”

“They’re perfect opposites!”

She groans. “No, I meant that you can use _Cabracadabra_ and our spaghetti strainers to save the city from the spaghetti!”

“Hmm,” says Todd. “I suppose that’s not a bad idea.”

* * *

Herb flicks through the options. “What about the Armenian genocide episode?”

“We saw that one on the bender,” answers BoJack dismissively. 

“The one where Sabrina makes too much spaghetti?”

“No, no point.”

“You said you wanted to watch _Horsin’ Around.”_

“Jesus, Herb, I don’t know what I want.”

Herb sighs. “BJ, I know that you’re worried about her, but you’ve already done everything you can to help her. It’s not healthy to just mope around all day.”

“I don’t know how to _be,_ Herb.” His voice is unsteady. “It doesn’t get better and it doesn’t get easier. I can’t keep lying to myself, saying I’m gonna change. I’m poison.”

“BJ…”

“I come from poison. I have poison inside me, and I destroy everything I touch. _That’s_ my legacy. I have nothing to show for the life I’ve lived, and I have nobody in my life that’s better off for having known me.”

“That’s not true.”

“Isn’t it, though?”

Herb sighs. “Look, BJ, let me tell you a story. Back in the 90s, I made a very famous TV show.”

“I know, I was there, remember? I was the lead actor.”

“Just listen,” continues Herb. “BJ, I don’t know _what_ I would have done if you had let me get fired. That show was my entire _life._ If they’d kicked me off when they wanted to, well … I don't know _what_ I’d have done. I might have even…” He stops mid-sentence and pauses thoughtfully. “No, I don’t think I’d have done _that._ The Knicks were having a good season.”

“Might have done what?” asks BoJack.

“It doesn’t matter. Point is -- You saved my career, and my show, and maybe even my life. There _are_ people who are better off for having known you -- you just need to let yourself believe that.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Remember that thing Princess Carolyn’s ex said to you?”

“Uh, which one?”

“His name was … I don’t know, I want to say Victor? And he said, ‘Don’t be sad … Good horsey.”

BoJack groans. “His name was Vincent Adultman and he was _obviously_ three kids in a trench coat.”

“I’m telling you, he was an adult.”

“He claimed to work at the ‘business factory’, does that sound like a real workplace?”

“Look, it doesn’t matter whether he was an adult or three kids in a trench coat. Point is, he had good advice. Don’t be sad, BJ. You saved Sarah Lynn’s life. _Good horsey.”_

“Ugh.” He turns off the TV. _“Horsin’ Around_ doesn’t feel the same right now. But I need to _do_ something. I want to act, but it’ll be hard to find a part now that I’ve fired Princess Carolyn.”

“What about _Ethan Around?”_

BoJack’s eyes light up. “Oh my God, Herb, that’s it. That’s _exactly_ what I need right now!” He stands up and pulls Herb into a tight hug. “Thank you so much! I’m going to call him _right now!”_

He exits the room, phone in hand, and Herb stares at him, stunned.

“Well, that went well.”

* * *

His phone rings halfway through a bizarre news story about how Cabracadabra saved an underwater city from a spaghetti-related natural disaster.

It’s a cover of the _Horsin’ Around_ theme, which makes him think of _Ethan Around._ Does it have a theme tune that? The _Horsin’ Around_ theme ends with the lyrics _‘We were lost but now we’re found/ And we’re Horsin’ Around!’_ Does _Ethan Around_ have the same words, but ending with ‘Ethan’ instead of ‘Horsin’’? How would that even work?”

He takes out the phone and stops dead.

It’s BoJack, and it’s at _least_ some six and a half hours before he’s supposed to be done with filming. Hesitantly, he answers it. “BJ?”

There’s a long, painful pause, and he can _hear_ BoJack breathing heavily. “...Can you pick me up?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. Why? Did something happen?”

“...” He hesitates. “There’s this girl there, Chloe. She plays Julia. And …”

* * *

A lighting issue forced them to cut, and after the obligatory “I’ll be in my trailer” joke, he patted Chloe on the back. “Hey, Chloe, that was really funny.”

She blushed. “Thanks.”

“Are you having fun?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“You got any friends in the audience?”

“No friends,” she said shyly. “But my mommy and my daddy.”

“Oh,” said BoJack. He assumed a conspiratorial tone. “You want to know a secret about your mommy and daddy?”

“What?” she asked anxiously. 

"They _really_ love you."

Her face turned a deeper shade of red. “Oh, I know that.”

BoJack, finally, smiled. “What do you want to be when you grow up, Chloe?”

“What do you mean?” she responded, as though it was obvious. “I want to be like you.”

BoJack’s heart skipped a beat. “...Like me?”

“I want to be famous.”

“...Oh, no.”

The room spun. His heart pounded. The only thing going through his head was the infinite circles of _it’s happening again, it’s happening again, it’s happening again._ He rose to his feet and took several staggering, terrified steps away from the girl as though she were a live bomb. 

“BoJack?” asked Ethan.

“Oh, _God.”_ He continued to back away from her.

“Is everything okay?” asked Ethan, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“I can’t be here,” he panted. “I can’t do this again. This isn’t right.”

“What do you mean?”

He turned to leave. _“I need to go.”_

* * *

Todd sells Cabracadabra. He’s halfway through deciding what to do with the eight million dollars he gets from it when he manages to accidentally tip it to a waitress. Once again broke, he goes back to Mr. Peanutbutter and Diane’s house, ready to get up to some whacky schemes.

Diane, having been fired from her previous job at Princess Carolyn’s failing agency, manages to get a job working for a blog called GirlCroosh, where she promises to write whatever she feels is true, no matter what. She thinks nothing of the promise. A few days later, when Mr. Peanutbutter’s ex-wife shows up at their door to offer him to position of Governor of California, she feels her chest tighten a little.

Princess Carolyn has a completely useless epiphany and turns her agency into a management company, which is exactly the same except people are called managers instead of agents. When her assistant makes her aware of a teenage girl who somehow got the company's number and wants to speak to BoJack, she leans back in her chair and says she no longer works for BoJack.

And Herb gives BoJack a lift home from the set of _Ethan Around,_ and the rest of the day goes by without event.

* * *

A quick glance at his phone reveals that it’s a little after midnight. The light from the screen produces no response from his sleeping husband, and so he manages to slip out of bed unnoticed. He tiptoes out of the room and goes outside.

It’s a nice night.

The night sky isn’t as beautiful as it was in the planetarium. There’s no spiraling galaxies, no soothing narrator, just a blank canvas of midnight blue littered with tiny stars. Can Sarah Lynn see the view of the planetarium, in her dreams? Does it haunt her, filling her with rightful fury at him? Or is it somehow peaceful?

He shakes his head. Nothing about it was peaceful. She lived a shitty life that consisted mostly of being surrounded by sycophants and enablers (and God knows he was both), freaked out upon realising just how much of her identity was destroyed by her years trying to please her fans, then gradually fell asleep at the planetarium. 

She’s not out of the woods yet. She could still die. And if she does, what will have been accomplished? She never got the chance to like herself. She never got the chance to have a normal childhood, unhindered by the demands of her fans. Has she ever even been happy without being high?

She might die now. She might die now, _because of him,_ without ever achieving happiness, or peace, or closure. There’s no beautiful tragedy in her story, nor is there likely to be a happy ending even if she does wake up. Her life, so far, has essentially just been a bunch of shit that happened.

...Then again, isn’t that all anyone’s lives are? Life’s a bitch, and then you keep living. 

And sometimes, life’s a bitch, and then you die.

It’s a nice night.

He takes a step forward, toward the pool. He can see the moon reflected in it. Which is odd, because the moon’s light is just a reflection of the sun’s. A reflection of a reflection. The version of himself that he sees when he stands over the pool is a murky reflection, visible only by light stolen from the sun, barely even a person. But then again, isn’t he the same?

Barely even a person.

He closes his eyes and jumps.

Chlorine enters his nose and eyes immediately. Despite how tightly shut his eyelids are, they sting furiously at the impact. His lungs quickly start aching, begging him for air, but he refuses. No matter how badly he wants to breathe, no matter how badly his limbs want to thrash around to keep him alive, he stays still.

But for some reason, almost on reflex, he opens his eyes.

He has no goggles, so everything is a blur, swirly and murky and tinted blue-green. He can barely figure out his surroundings. The white glowy thing far above him is presumably the moon, and there’s a humanoid figure that he thinks is standing just over the edge of the pool, and …

 _Shit,_ that’s _Herb._

A mere blurry glimpse of him is enough to send BoJack back to reality. What was he _thinking?_ He can’t do this, not to Herb, he _can’t._ His instincts rush forward and he flails frantically, struggling to break the surface. He finally manages to gasp in a full breath of air, and he feels himself being pulled upwards.

The next thing he knows, he’s lying on the ground, staring up at Herb, who’s struggling to catch his breath, a horrified look on his face. “What were you _thinking?!”_ he yells.

The look on BoJack’s face tells him all he needs to know.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> real talk, after writing this fic I have lost my ability to say that the finale of bojack horseman came off as slightly cheap because they spent a whole episode building up to the reveal of his death and then exploring his acceptance of that, only to then reverse it all in the finale with a five-second bait-and-switch gag.
> 
> like seriously. I spent like 2 whole chapters building up the question of what BJ would do after Herb died of cancer, including multiple references to car crashes which is how he died in canon, and then in the first lines of Still Broken was all like "lol nope hes tweeting in the passenger seat in this au because he gets a lift home :)"
> 
> and I spent basically half of last chapter exploring BJ's motivation as he decides whether to save Sarah Lynn, building up the drama of what he would choose, and then this chapter is all like "lol nope shes in a coma"
> 
> I am so sorry. though on the bright side this wont happen again since theres basically no canonical character deaths after season 3 ends? theres Zach Braff but hes a pretty minor character so thered be no need to build up the drama of whether or not he dies, and theres Beatrice but there is literally no conceivable narrative reason that BoJack deciding to not let Herb get fired in the 90s would somehow stop her from dying of old age. so yeah, from this point on, all characters who die in canon will die in the fic.


	12. Hooray! Todd Chapter!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While BoJack and Herb enjoy a 'mental health day' in Michigan that's been continuing for the last year and a half, Todd meets a strange new girl with potential relations to BoJack.

The room is alight with chatter about him. Some say he was previously in a prison gang. Others say he is a foreign prince. One person claims he’s a tech millionaire. Another tells a story of how he saved a pregnant woman from drowning in a shipwreck, then delivered her baby on a piece of driftwood, then engaged in a spirited but respectful debate about the pros and cons of circumcision with her before eventually deciding to circumcise the boy.

The only thing they can agree upon is that he gives his all to help others -- that’s why they know him in the first place. Their previous triangle player starved to death after getting his foot stuck in his triangle, somehow. So Todd Chavez took over.

“You know,” says one person. “Sometimes when that triangle part is coming up, I find myself hoping he won’t show up. No man should be asked to give that much.”

At that moment, the man himself finally enters. “Whoa! Oh, hey, guys. I was eating a taco earlier and I got salsa on my shirt. I went to clean it off, but then when I put my hands in the automatic dryer I forgot I was still holding the taco. I got my hands all greasy, so I couldn’t open the doorknob for an hour.”

Truly an icon.

* * *

While Mr. Peanutbutter plans to give a passionate speech about fracking that never actually states his opinion on fracking, Todd somehow agrees to Princess Carolyn’s request that he date Courtney Portnoy.

He does not know Courtney Portnoy. He does not want to date Courtney Portnoy. He does not have time to date Courtney Portnoy. Yet, he is dating Courtney Portnoy.

Immediately after being roped into dating a woman he neither knows nor cares for, he gets chloroformed.

Just another day in the life of a Mr. Todd Chavez.

* * *

When he wakes up, the first thing his blurry vision tells him is that it’s BoJack. Brown fur, horse muzzle, white diamond -- it all checks out, at least until he starts thinking about it. More trademarked BoJack Horseman bullshit -- chloroforming him for some reason. But once his vision clears a little, he sees the differences -- the horse standing over him is shorter, a young girl, and the white diamond is the only marking on her face, no pink spot on her muzzle or white pyramid. Her fur is a lighter, redder shade of brown, with light brown freckles, and her hair is longer and brown instead of black. She’s wearing black ripped jeans and a long-sleeved teal shirt, and he can faintly see two piercings in her ear.

On instinct he rises, trying to get away, but she waves her arms frantically to reassure him. “Calm down, I’m not going to hurt you. My name is Hollyhock Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack.”

Todd blinks. “Wait, wait, wait. What’s your first name?”

“Hollyhock.”

“...And your last name?”

“Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack.”

“Got it.” He pauses. “Wait, what’s your last name?”

She sighs. “I know, it’s confusing. I have eight dads.”

“How’d that happen?” asks Todd. “Test tubes?”

“No, I was adopted.”

“Oh, of course.”

“By eight men in a committed gay polyamorous relationship.”

“...Less of course.”

“But ever since I was a baby,” she explains. “People always said I looked like BoJack Horseman.”

Todd gasps dramatically. “That’s a  _ terrible  _ thing to say to a baby!”

She ignores this. “And I’ve always wondered if BoJack could be my biological …” She hesitates. “...Sperm guy.”

“Well, I guess it is possible,” he mutters. “I don’t know how long he and Herb have been together.”

“I came to L.A. to get to the bottom of things. I even brought a deluxe spy kit.” She rubs the back of her neck nervously. “Sorry about knocking you out. Once you have chloroform, you can’t  _ not  _ use it.”

“No, I get it. BoJack had one of those spy kits, too. He mostly just used it on himself, though.”

Hollyhock holds up a book that proudly displays the words  _ One Trick Pony  _ on the cover. “I read in this book that you live together. Can you help me find him?”

“Sorry,” says Todd. “I don’t live there anymore. Besides, nobody’s seen Herb or BoJack in a while. Herb says they went on a road trip because BoJack needed a ‘mental health day’ that ended up lasting a year and a half.”

“I guess I don’t have to meet him,” says Hollyhock. “All I need is a DNA sample, like a piece of hair or something.”

Todd thinks for a moment. “I guess there’s probably some hair somewhere. I think I still have my key somewhere, but we’ll have to go back to Mr. Peanutbutter’s house to get it.”

“Well, let’s go, then.”

“Just a sec, I should probably call Herb first.”

He scrolls through his contacts and tries to call Herb, but it goes to voicemail. “Oh. I guess we’d better go, then.”

* * *

He finally stares at the empty drawer, and the pile of things that were previously in it, now shoved ungracefully onto the floor. The sheer amount of dust makes him cough, accumulated over years of disuse. “What even  _ is  _ half of this stuff?”

“Well, I know  _ this  _ was my grandmother’s lucky charm before she got lobotomised,” answers BoJack, holding up a large golden horseshoe. “Not a clue about anything else, though.”

Herb sighs and takes out his phone. “Maybe it’s time for a break. Let me check the time.” His eyes widen. “Oh, Todd left a voicemail.”

“Hmm, what’s it say?”

Herb plays the voicemail.

_ “Hey, Herb! Things are craaaazy over here. I’m dating Courtney Portnoy and also Mr. Peanutbutter might be governor of California! Which is, like, a whole thing. Anyway, I got chloroformed and now I’m breaking into your house to see if your husband has an illegitimate daughter, hope that’s okay. Call me back!” _

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“Should I call him back?” asks Herb.

“Nah, it’s probably just more Todd hijinks. If it’s important he’ll call again.”

* * *

As Mr. Peanutbutter declares his support of fracking without knowing what fracking is, much to Diane’s chagrin, Todd finds a strand of brown fur. Even after a year and a half without seeing him, he can easily recognize that it’s the dull brown of BoJack’s hide. 

He’s already pulled out a strand of his own hair, in solidarity with Hollyhock, when she remembers a hairbrush she can instead use. Todd leaves her in BoJack’s house as he rushes off to several dates with Courtney Portnoy.

With a technique known as “lying to Diane”, he manages to get her to test the DNA for him while he’s busy. He rushes home.

Well, not  _ home.  _ He moved out a long time ago. But it’s hard not to think of it that way, after he lived there for so long.

“Did you get the results?” asks Hollyhock.

He hesitates. “Are you sure you want to know? I don’t know if BoJack is ready to be a father.”

“Oh.” Her face falls. “Well, that’s fine. I already have eight dads. It's not like a ninth dad is what I need to suddenly fill a hole in my life that the unconditional love of eight dads couldn't already fill.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“...Is it a match?”

* * *

“Is that your phone or mine?”

Herb checks his pockets. “It must be yours.”

“Ugh, god dammit.” He takes his phone out and stops dead. “Shit, it’s Todd.”

“Todd?” Herb raises an eyebrow. 

“He hasn’t called me since he moved out. I’d better answer.” Gulping down his fear, he answers the call. “...Todd?”

“BoJack,” says Todd frantically. “Look, I’m still upset with you, but I  _ need  _ to tell you this. There’s something you should know.”

“...What?” asks BoJack anxiously.

“It’s … not something you can really say over the phone. You’ve  _ got  _ to come back to L.A., like,  _ right now.” _

He hangs up before BoJack can ask for clarification. BoJack puts his phone back in his pocket with shaking hands. “Shit.”

“What?” asks Herb.

“I don’t know. But he said I have to come back to L.A.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“I mean,” says Herb. “This ‘mental health day’ thing has been going on for a while.”

“How long has it been?”

“A year and a half.”

“...Shit, I’d better get home.”

* * *

One accidental engagement with Courtney Portnoy later, he rushes back to BoJack’s house. “BoJack and Herb should be home soon,” he pants, at Hollyhock’s raised eyebrow. He looks at the house. “Why is there a photo album on the floor?”

“Oh, I’ve been snooping around in BoJack’s stuff,” she explains.

“Is that all you’ve done?”

“Well, I also ate ice cream. Then I took a nap.”

“...I don’t know why I bothered with the DNA test.”

It’s several long, excruciating minutes before they hear the Tesla sliding into the driveway and the click of the door being unlocked. BoJack is first inside, his eyes widening as he takes in the scene; Herb is a little behind him, freezing in shock at the sight of the unfamiliar horse.

Todd clears his throat. “Herb, BoJack,” he says in an unsteady voice. “This is Hollyhock. She’s … new to L.A. and wanted to meet you.”

“Hi,” mutters the girl shyly, waving timidly. “I’m Hollyhock Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack.”

“Of the Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack law firm?” asks Herb. BoJack gives him a hi five at the joke.

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Hey Hollyhock,” suggests Todd. “Why don’t you go and get us some ice cream?” 

Herb instantly picks up on the excuse and takes his credit card out of his pocket. “Take this,” he insists. “Get as much as you want.”

Hollyhock has a raised eyebrow as she takes the card, and it’s clear that she can tell it’s all an excuse to get her out of the room, but she nonetheless obliges and leaves. The second she’s out of sight, Todd lets out a shaky sigh. “BoJack, I gotta tell you, um… Hollyhock is your daughter.”

BoJack’s jaw drops. “What?”

“She’s your daughter,” he repeats.

“I-I don’t understand.”

“She has Horseman DNA. You’re her father.”

Herb finally manages to pick his jaw up off the ground enough to ask, “How old is she?”

“Seventeen.”

“That’s impossible,” says BoJack automatically. 

Todd sighs. “We can talk about Hollyhock later. I just … I don’t know, BoJack, I haven’t had a chance to talk to you since last year and I need to tell you this. I talked to Emily about your fight with her.” 

“...Shit,” says BoJack. There’s not much else to say.

“And, uh, I found out what actually caused it,” continues Todd. “I still think you shouldn’t have yelled at her, but … thanks for standing up for me, or trying to, I guess.”

“You’re welcome, I guess.” He rubs the back of his neck nervously. “Do you know if she’d be okay with talking to me again? I want to apologise but I don’t want to make her uncomfortable.”

“I don’t know, I’ll ask her later.” He chuckles nervously. “I haven’t seen her in a while. We … broke up a few months ago.”

Herb frowns. “Shit, what happened?”

“Nothing happened,” says Todd reassuringly. “We just … realised we weren’t right for each other, is all.” There’s a long, awkward pause. “I think I’m asexual.”

“A sexual  _ what?”  _ asks BoJack. “Dynamo, deviant, harassment lawsuit waiting to happen?”

“No,  _ asexual,  _ not sexual.”

_ “Oh.” _

Herb holds out a hand for him to hi-five. “Welcome to the club!”

“What club?” asks BoJack. He sighs. “Ugh, it doesn’t matter.” He turns to Todd. “So, if you’re not upset about Emily --”

Todd holds up a hand. “It wasn’t just Emily,” he insists. “It was a lot of things, and I don’t know if we can be friends again.”

“...Oh.” BoJack’s face falls.

“...But we can be more than not-friends.”

* * *

The orchestra continues on. The players spare regular glances at the empty seat, but weeks of showing that he’s reliable despite his tardiness have made them numb to any anxiety.

The triangle solo comes up, and the hall is silent.

“Good for him,” says one man.

The triangle player has forgotten his orchestra. In between dates with Courtney Portnoy and whacky, bizarre schemes, he goes to a corner of a restaurant. People are chatting eagerly, already clearly familiar with each other, and he suddenly feels self-conscious, as the newcomer. But, he takes a deep breath, and prepares to introduce himself.

The wall behind them proudly displays a sign, with purple, grey, black, and white colours, that says  _ ASEXUAL MEET-UP. _

Just another day in the life of a Mr. Todd Chavez.

* * *

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Hollyhock,” begins BoJack. “I’m just going to say it. I  _ can’t  _ be your father. It’s literally not possible.”

“Well, we share DNA,” says Hollyhock. “So we must be related.”

“I don’t know, maybe it was some mistake. Besides,” he sighs. “Even if I  _ was  _ your father, I’m not in a good place right now to act like one. I can’t offer you parental guidance, or advice, or support, or prolonged conversation with you.”

“I’m not looking for another dad,” says Hollyhock. “But I’ve always wanted to know who my mother is.”

BoJack is about to say he doesn’t know if he can help her with that when she says, “Just tell me the name of the woman you had sex with in December of 1999, that’s all the relationship we need to have.”

BoJack looks at Herb. Herb looks at BoJack. Hollyhock looks at both of them, completely oblivious to the tension she’s just created.

Herb stands up. “Excuse me,” he says tersely. “BoJack and I just need to have a bit of a private discussion about this.”


	13. Disc Horse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herb believes BoJack must have cheated on him to conceive Hollyhock, while BoJack is offended that Herb doesn't trust him. A fight ensues.

You could hear a pin drop in the bedroom. 

Herb lets out a long, dwindling sigh. “That girl really wants to know who her mom is,” he says slowly, looking down at the ground.

BoJack says nothing.

“And as adults,” he continues. “I think we have something of a duty to help her find her mom, even if --  _ hypothetically --  _ we were worried about our partners being angry, or hurt, or…” His face falls. “Or having a horrific feeling of betrayal even though it happened  _ years  _ ago because I don’t understand why you never told me…” He clears his throat. “I think even if we were, hypothetically, worried about that, we should still be honest right now.”

BoJack finally looks up. His expression is hard to read -- disappointed, perhaps. “Shit, Herb, you really think she’s my daughter?”

“She has Horseman DNA,” says Herb. “Todd said so.”

“Jesus, Herb, you’re really gonna believe that right away? Like, I dunno, couldn’t you maybe have a little more faith in your husband?”

In an instant his mood changes. He glares at BoJack, and snaps, “Don’t talk  _ shit  _ to me about faith when  _ you’re  _ the one who’s being  _ unfaithful.” _

BoJack takes a step back anxiously. “Woah, calm down.”

Herb sighs. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.” He rubs his arm nervously. “I mean, it was, what, almost eighteen years ago? It’s fine, I just wish you’d told me --”

“Told you  _ what?”  _ asks BoJack. “I never cheated on you. Why don’t you believe me?”

“You have a  _ daughter.”  _ He groans. “I don’t know why you’re trying to pretend there’s another explanation here, BJ. I already know, it’s not going to make me angrier than I already am. Just come clean, for Hollyhock’s sake.”

“She’s not my daughter,” says BoJack automatically. “I-I mean, she can’t be. There must be some mistake, or --”

“Jesus Christ, BoJack, if you’re going to cheat on me then at least have the balls to admit it.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“It really hurts that you don’t trust me,” mutters BoJack quietly, looking at the ground.

“Don’t you trust me enough to tell me the truth?” Herb’s voice is softer, as though he can tell the nerve he’s hit is somewhat genuine, but he’s not giving up just yet. “Come on, BJ. I’m not going to leave you over something that happened eighteen years ago. But you’ve gotta be honest with me, for Hollyhock.”

“I  _ am  _ being honest.”

“Then where did Hollyhock come from?”

“I don’t know.”

Herb sighs loudly. “It would have been in 1999. December, like she said.”

“Even if I wanted to -- which I didn’t,” says BoJack defensively. “I wouldn’t have had time. That was a  _ really  _ crazy year, remember?  _ Horsin’ Around  _ was cancelled, my grandfather died, and December would have been even worse because of all the turn-of-the-millenium New Year stuff.”

“Hmm,” says Herb thoughtfully. He assumes a detective-like tone of voice. “I remember 1999. In fact, I remember that painting we got after your grandfather died.”

* * *

“Running out of mustard? Divorce. Feeling a little sad? Divorce --”

“Come  _ on,  _ mom, nobody ever gets divorced over mustard. You know that. You and dad should just --”

Beatrice opened her mouth to argue, but Herb stepped between the two, hoping that at least one of them would have the decency to not fight in front of him. “It’s  _ great  _ to see you, Beatrice.” he lies.

“Of course it is. Must be nice to see anything  _ real  _ when you’re wasting your life on those silly stories for your TV show.” She scoffed. “I made  _ so many  _ sacrifices for BoJack, and this is all he’s doing.”

BoJack opened his mouth to protest, but Herb once again steped in. “Well, actually, we’re just doing the last few episodes of  _ Horsin’ Around  _ at the moment. As of 1999 -- the year which it currently is -- the show’s been going for twelve seasons, thanks to the work of a great writer. It was fun, but we’ve decided it’s run its course.”

Beatrice sighed. “Anyway, I came to see if you wanted this painting.” She held up the large painting in her hands. “It belonged to your grandfather.”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll take it,” answered BoJack, after Herb gave him a look that clearly communicates that this visit was to be finished as soon as possible.

“Of course,” Beatrice muttered as Herb took the painting off her and started dragging it to lean against the wall. “All you do is take.” She glared at Herb and added, “Still trying to do this  _ gay  _ thing, are you?”

“Yes, Mom,” answered BoJack, not even trying to keep the annoyance out of his voice.

She scoffed. “And yet you tell me I should divorce Butterscotch.” She turns to leave. “Now that you have Joseph’s painting, you ought to be making an effort to live up to his legacy. He was a man who knew what marriage was.”

As she began to walk off, BoJack called after her.

“Didn’t he lobotomize grandma?!?!”

* * *

“Why do you remember that one specific conversation we had eighteen years ago in such detail?”

“I have a good memory,” says Herb dismissively. “What that conversation proved to me was that in 1999, your mother was planting the seeds of internalised homophobia in your mind, giving you a reason to choose to spend an intimate night with someone else.”

“Yeah, except she did that every year, you dingus. Why are you trying to talk like a goddamn detective?”

“But,” says Herb, ignoring this. “This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of a Ms. Hollyhock Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack.”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “Yeah it is?”

“Or is it?”

* * *

“I’m telling you, this foal looks just like you.”

BoJack, however reluctantly, looked up from the TV screen and paused the episode of  _ Horsin’ Around.  _ “Who looks like me?”

“The girl in this newspaper,” answered Herb, showing the paper to BoJack. “This newspaper from 2000 -- the year which it currently is -- has this story about a horse girl that was adopted by eight gay men.” 

“Seriously?” He picked up the newspaper and read the column. “Geez, it sucks that gay people can adopt now.”

Herb raised an eyebrow. “You do realise that we’re … ?”

“Of course I know we’re gay,” snapped BoJack. “It’s just such bullshit. Remember when I had to threaten to quit the show so they wouldn’t fire you? It’s not fair that gay people today have it so good.” Before Herb can argue, he added, “Besides, I don’t see the resemblance.”

“She’s got a diamond just like yours.”

“So? Plenty of horses have diamonds.” He squinted at the page. “And her last name is totally bullshit. Why do we have to use all of the father’s surnames? Can’t you at least only have one Manheim?”

“One of the Manheims has two Ns and the other only has one.”

“Ugh, whatever.” He un-paused  _ Horsin’ Around.  _ Herb sighed, but said nothing.

* * *

“And you remembered that very specific conversation too? For the last seventeen years? In enough detail to recount it word for word?!”

“I told you, I have a good memory,” says Herb, waving a hand dismissively.

“Jesus Christ, Herb, did you ass cancer somehow get replaced with as- _ perger’s?  _ Because that’s the only explanation I can see for you suddenly having a photographic memory.”

“It’s called an  _ echoic  _ memory if it’s for conversation, and Asperger’s was merged with autism spectrum disorder in the DSM V.”

“Not helping your case.”

Herb clears his throat. “Point is, in 2000, I pointed out the obvious resemblance -- but you denied it, didn’t you? You just wanted me to shut up about her. Because you  _ knew  _ there was a possibility that she was yours -- because in December of 1999, the stress was too much for you and you cheated on me!”

“No I didn’t,” says BoJack tiredly. “I wanted you to shut up about her because the whole thing was annoying bullshit and I was in the middle of an episode.”

“Oh,” says Herb. “The whole thing was annoying bullshit, was it? I recall you said that at the time.”

“I know, you just told me. That’s why I said it was.”

“And what, may I ask, was the bullshit?” He starts pacing around the room, hands clasped behind his back, in a mockery of Sherlock Holmes. “Was it the fact that gay people were allowed to adopt a child? Was  _ that  _ the bullshit?”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” BoJack groans. “If you’re about to call me homophobic, then you can shove it up your cancerous and/or autistic ass, okay?! I’m literally  _ married  _ to a man. Just because I  _ resent  _ the gay youth of today that have it easier than  _ we  _ did doesn’t mean you get to call me homophobic when I’m  _ married to you  _ as part of your stupid-ass conspiracy to prove that I cheated on you!”

_ “Conspiracy?!”  _ chokes Herb, tempers once again rising. “You have a  _ daughter!  _ I’m trying to assume good faith, but what am I meant to believe?! That she just  _ appeared  _ out of nowhere?!”

“Well I don’t know, Herb, maybe if you stopped accusing me of  _ bullshit  _ then I could figure something out!”

“Yeah, sure, ‘cause it’s all just  _ bullshit,  _ isn’t it?! I think your daughter didn’t just  _ pop into existence? Bullshit _ . LGBT rights are a thing?  _ Bullshit _ . I point out that something you said was homophobic? Must be --”

_ “How  _ can I be homophobic?!” chokes BoJack, frustration at an absolute peak.  _ “I’m  _ gay!”

“But you’re not, are you?”

Herb’s voice is suddenly calm, a sharp contrast to the previous yelling. You could hear a pin drop in the silence that follows.

“Oh, so suddenly I’m not gay.” It’s not a question.

“There’s nothing  _ sudden  _ about it,” snaps Herb. “It’s been an accepted fact for decades.”

“Yes, but I think it’s awfully  _ interesting  _ that you bring it up now.” Neither of them are yelling now, or snapping with anger; they’re talking quietly and slowly, pointedly, with venom behind every word. 

“What are you implying?” Herb knows very well what’s being implied. BoJack knows he knows. All questions at this point are just distractions, stalling so that neither of them have to say what’s on their minds, so that nobody has to make the accusation.

“I’m not  _ implying  _ anything,” says BoJack. “I just think it’s kinda  _ weird  _ that you only seem to think it’s important now, you know, when you think I cheated on you.”

“What’s so  _ weird  _ about wanting you to be accurate?”

They stare each other down, each willing the other to break eye contact. BoJack is the first to realise that neither of them will. He swallows back the tension and says, “You  _ do  _ know that it’s a stereotype that bisexuals always cheat?”

“Gee, I  _ wonder  _ why,” deadpans Herb.

BoJack clenches his fists in fury. “What are you saying?”

“That I should have expected this,” snaps Herb. “Of course I wasn’t  _ good enough  _ for you, nobody’s  _ ever  _ enough for  _ you.  _ Was it just Hollyhock’s mother? How many women have you banged while we were together?”

“None!”

“You really expect me to believe that?”

There’s a long, painful silence. They glare at each other, seething with rage, breathing hard through gritted teeth and trembling head to toe, fists clenched, but neither have the courage to break the silence. Neither know what to say.

The door swings open. Hollyhock shoves her head into the room. In an instant they unclench their fists and try to relax, with the result that they look like they’re doing a poor job at pretending not to be angry.

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow. “You know, I can tell you were angry. I heard basically everything you said, you were screaming your heads off.”

“Sorry,” says Herb.

“I’m hungry,” says Hollyhock. “I tried to make a pop tart but I kind of almost set the house on fire. Can we order pizza?”

There’s a long, ominous silence. BoJack clears his throat. “Of course we can. We’ll have dinner together, as a _ family.” _

Herb doesn’t  _ say  _ “oh, so you admit she’s your family?”, but he certainly thinks it very loudly. He instead clears his throat abnormally loudly. “Of course. Let’s go order pizza,  _ together.” _

* * *

They essentially sit in silence while they wait for the pizza. Hollyhock, in an attempt to get everyone in the same room and talking, insists that they eat at the table, with plates and cutlery and everything.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles shyly between bites.

Herb frowns. “What for?”

“I don’t know, coming and making you fight. This whole thing was stupid. I never should have come out here. And I don’t even care about having a mom, really, because I did fine for seventeen years without one.”

BoJack sighs. “Hollyhock, it’s okay to want a mom.”

“No it’s not! Because that means my dads weren’t enough for me, and they  _ are!” _

BoJack bites back a remark about how it’s the Horseman curse, knowing it would only make things worse. 

“Hollyhock,” says Herb gently. “It’s normal that you want to learn about your biological family. You don’t have to feel bad about it. And we’ll find your mother soon enough.”

The next bite that BoJack takes of his pizza seems somehow angry, but he can’t overtly show his anger, not in front of Hollyhock.

Hollyhock finishes eating quickly and stands up. “Well, I’m going to go call my dads. Have fun with your ace discourse, I guess.”

Herb blinks. “Ace discourse?”

“Uh, yeah, that Tumblr thing?” She shakes her head. “It was meant to be a joke, that’s all. You were arguing about stuff that sounded like it could be Tumblr discourse.”

“What’s Tumblr?” asks BoJack.

Her eyes widen. “Geez, how old are you?”

“Ha ha, very funny, I’m  _ old.  _ Just answer the question.”

“It’s this app that people use to send each other death threats over whether they think asexual people are part of the LGBT community. Stupid, I know. Have fun.”

She walks outside to call one of her dads, while BoJack scoffs. “We are  _ not  _ going to argue over whether asexual people are LGBT.”

“Exactly,” says Herb. “Since we both agree that they are.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “...Shit.”

* * *

He blinks several times, groaning in exasperation. “What does Secretariat have to do with any of this?”

“If you’re allowed to bring random ace people into this, I’m allowed to bring random non-ace people into it,” says BoJack stubbornly. 

“Todd isn’t a ‘random ace person’, he’s one of my closest friends. Besides, how does Secretariat actually help your case?”

“I don’t know.” He groans. “I feel like we’ve just been arguing all night.”

“It has been almost …” He takes out his phone and his eyes widen. “Holy shit, we’ve been at this for the last three hours. It’s past midnight.”

“That explains why I’m so tired,” says BoJack. He grabs a pillow from the bed. “I’m gonna go make like Todd and sleep on the couch.” He turns to leave.

“...BJ?” 

Annoyed, he turns to face Herb again. “Yeah?”

“That’s going to be really uncomfortable, you know.”

“Yeah.” There’s venom in his voice despite the calmness, and he starts walking off. “I know.”

* * *

Herb is right. It’s  _ really  _ uncomfortable. He has no idea why Todd always rejected the guest room. He barely managed to get six hours of restless sleep, and he wakes up sore all over and even more tired than he was the previous night. He makes a mental note to never sleep on the couch again, and then immediately realises that he absolutely will do it again out of pure stubbornness.

It’s early in the morning, before Hollyhock awakens, when Herb comes down to talk to him. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” he answers through gritted teeth, because his pride forbids him from admitting that Herb was right. 

Herb rubs the back of his neck nervously. “Hey, I wanted to talk to you about … you know. I feel bad about what I said yesterday when we were arguing.”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “So you’re apologising.” It’s not a question.

“Yes. I’m sorry.”

“Okay,” says BoJack calmly. “I don’t forgive you.”

Herb’s eyes widen, visibly taken aback, but he quickly regains his composure. “Well, I don’t forgive  _ you  _ for cheating on me.”

“Oh, yes, I can really  _ see  _ how sorry you are.”

The arguing starts again, and it doesn’t halt until Hollyhock wakes up. They greet her with strained smiles and half-assed attempts at friendly conversation, and wait for her to leave the room so they can continue in seething rage. 

They hope she doesn’t notice, but of course, she does.

* * *

“To be honest,” says BoJack at the dinner table one evening. “Moms aren’t all that great. In fact, in my experience, they’re soulless succubi born fully formed from the ass of Satan.”

“My grandmother sounds like quite a character,” snarks Hollyhock. “Can I meet her?”

BoJack falters, but Herb, thank God, is still willing to step in to save him. “BoJack doesn’t really have a good relationship with his mother,” he explains uneasily. “It’s probably not a good idea for them to be together.”  _ While he’s already fighting with me,  _ he doesn’t add, but he certainly thinks it very loudly.

“Fine,” says Hollyhock. “How come we never eat breakfast together?”

They all know the real reason: because mealtimes is the only time they feel obligated to be civil to each other, and doing it twice a day is hard enough. “Well,” mutters Herb. “We don’t always get up at the same time…”

“I’m trying this new diet,” explains BoJack. “I sleep in until lunchtime so I only have to eat two meals a day.” At Hollyhock’s pleading look, he quickly adds, “But, if I’m ever up early enough, we’ll make sure to have breakfast together.”

“Okay.” An annoying stock ringtone fills the room and she quickly stands up. “Sorry, I have to take this, it’s one of my dads.”

For some reason, she doesn’t even have the sense to leave the room.

“Hi,” she says warmly. “Yeah, everything’s okay, I’m with BoJack and Herb … Actually, they’re having a fight right now. But, everything’s fine. I’m  _ loving  _ L.A., it’s been so fun! Anyway, I’ll call you back, I’m meant to be having dinner with BoJack and Herb right now.”

There’s a short pause, and they can only assume her father is asking,  _ “I thought they were having a fight?” _

“Well,  _ yeah,”  _ says Hollyhock, as though it’s obvious. “But they still love each other.”


	14. Fat Piece of Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Herb and BoJack continue to argue and give each other the cold shoulder.

_ Piece of shit. _

His eyes shoot open.

_ Fat piece of shit.  _

With a groan, he starts to sit up.

_ You’re a real fat piece of shit. But I know I’m a piece of shit. That makes me better than all the pieces of shit who don’t know they’re pieces of shit. Or is it worse? _

He glances around the room and groans. Nobody else is awake yet -- he must be up early. Stupid-ass uncomfortable couch.  _ Breakfast. _

_ Oh, I don’t deserve breakfast. _

_ Shut up. Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Get breakfast, you stupid fat-ass. _

He goes to the kitchen to get himself some cookies.

_ These are cookies. This is not breakfast. You are eating cookies. Stop it. Stop eating cookies, go make yourself breakfast. Stop it. Don’t eat one more cookie. Put that down. Do not eat that cookie. _

He eats the cookie.

_ I can’t believe you ate that cookie. _ _  
_

* * *

It’s a little over an hour later when Hollyhock wakes up. She checks the fridge, then frowns. “Hey, BoJack, we need milk.”

“Huh?” he answers sleepily.

“You said if you were ever up early enough we would eat breakfast together,” she explains. “But there’s no milk. Can I borrow your car?”

BoJack freezes.

_ Shit. I don’t want her driving my car, getting her grubby hands all over -- She’s not grubby, she’s your daughter, you piece of garbage. No she isn’t, she can’t be your daughter because you never cheated on Herb.  _

_ Or did you?  _

_ Don’t be ridiculous, you would know if you’d cheated on Herb.  _

_ But honestly, that’s exactly the sort of stupid bullshit you would do, you son of a bitch. _

“Can I take the car or what?” asks Hollyhock.

_ Think, idiot. If she takes the car, you’re trapped here with Herb and you’ll probably start fighting again. If you get the milk and leave Hollyhock with Herb, he could tell her things about you, poison your own not-daughter against you, is that what you want? _

“Okay,” he says uneasily. “How about, um, hold on…”

Hollyhock looks at him.  _ She’s looking! Say something! Open your fat idiot mouth! _

“...I will get milk.”

He goes out to the car. 

_ What are they talking about now? Probably you and what a fat piece of trash you are, you fat sack of idiot. Why don’t you do the world a favour and drive into your pool?  _

_ No, you don’t deserve to die young, only the greats die young.  _

_ Oh, now you think you’re young all of a sudden? _

He pulls up in front of a bar.

_ One drink. _

As usual, it’s more than one drink.

* * *

He comes home some eight and a half hours later, drunk off his ass, to find that Herb got the milk in his place after about an hour with no word from him, and that Hollyhock was going to save him some of the breakfast but then ate it herself.

“That’s perfect,” he slurs, stumbling around. “I didn’t want breakfast anyway.”

“Part of your new diet?” asks Herb, in a tone that could be friendly banter but could also be viciously insulting, and based on context it’s probably the latter. “The one where you get so drunk you can’t make food?”

“Yeah,” he answers. “You two can make dinner, I’m gonna go and … sleep. G’night.”

“It’s six PM,” says Hollyhock. This is ignored as he stumbles out of the room. As he falls into bed, he also falls into the routine of life with Herb and Hollyhock -- similar to the previous one, which mainly involved arguing with Herb when Hollyhock wasn’t looking, but with more drinking.

More drinking is perhaps not a good idea.

* * *

Once again, he stumbles home. Hollyhock is in the living room, reading. Herb is somewhere else, probably the bedroom -- but he’s not in BoJack’s line of sight, and therefore he may as well be in Russia for all the horse cares. He’s too tired and too depressed and too  _ drunk  _ to not say what’s on his mind. “Herb’s being totally unfair.”

Hollyhock groans. “Who cares? Even if you didn’t cheat -- which it kinda seems like you did -- to  _ him,  _ it’s obviously the only explanation. How are you ever going to deal with this if you’re fighting all the time?”

_ She’s right.  _ “Wrong. He should trust me.”

“Could you at least  _ try  _ to see things from his point of view?”

“Maybe  _ he  _ should try seeing things from  _ my  _ point-of-view,” he half-slurs drunkenly. He takes a few steps toward the deck window. “I  _ never  _ cheated on him.”

“Yeah, it’s all well and good to say that like it’ll solve everything,” says Hollyhock irritably. “But  _ lying  _ is a thing, and the fact that you’re always fighting with him doesn’t exactly help.”

“Would a  _ liar  _ do this?” he asks, almost punching the window, but missing horribly due to a combination of distance and drunkenness.

“BoJack, don’t,” warns Hollyhock.

_ Do it. _

“Nah, I’m just kidding around.” He steps away from the window, then ‘falls’ back toward it. “Oh, no! The floor is so slippery!”

There’s a deafening crash as he throws his body weight against the window and collapses onto the deck ungracefully in a pile of glass. Shards pierce his skin, leaving blood dripping all over his body, mixing with his fur, and he struggles to catch his breath. He props himself up on his arms, wincing at the pain, and attempts to get to his feet but remains on his hands and knees.  _ Nice hit. _

_ “Why _ did you  _ do  _ that?” asks Hollyhock with a mix of horror and disgust.

_ You goddamn piece of shit idiot asshole. _

_ This is what you do, this is what you always do. This is why Herb thinks you cheated on him. Would a loyal, trustworthy partner do this?! Gotta make things right, gotta fix the window. _

He takes a shard of glass from the floor and tries to slot it into the part of the window that’s still standing. Unsurprisingly, this does not work.

_ You screw-up. You’re making your not-daughter hate you. Which is good, because look at what happens when people love you. Look at Penny. And Sarah Lynn. And … Herb. It’s because you made them love you, BoJack. _

_ How can you fix this? _

“Everything okay? I heard glass breaking and -- holy shit! BJ?!”

_ God dammit, why couldn’t you fix it before Herb got here?! _

“BJ, you…” He sighs loudly before he can finish the sentence. He turns to Hollyhock. “I’m sorry you had to see that.” He places his arms around BoJack’s torso to pull him to his feet. It’s the first time they’ve touched in too long. “Look, I’m gonna take you to our room and patch you up, okay?”

“Mm-hmm,” BoJack mumbles weakly. He tries not to be too heavy as Herb half-drags, half-carries him away.

* * *

When the wounds have been carefully bandaged and disinfected and they exit the room, they see that Hollyhock is outside, pacing furiously.

_ Go talk to her, idiot. _

_ Drink first. _

_ No, you stupid alcoholic. Talk to your not-daughter. You’re ruining her. You know that, right? No matter what, your poison is already in her. There’s nothing you can do. _

_ That’s not true. _

_ Yeah it is, you fat piece of shit. You’re a real fat piece of shit, and everywhere you go you destroy people. That’s why your mother never loved you. That’s why Sarah Lynn’s in a coma, that’s why Charlotte will never forgive you. What are you gonna do to Hollyhock? What are you gonna do, asshole? _

Herb sighs and places a hand on BoJack’s shoulder, then catches himself and withdraws it as though he touched an open flame. “Look, you’d better go rest up. I’ll talk to her.

Herb goes outside to find Hollyhock has now stopped pacing in favour of kicking the car in frustration. “Hey, calm down,” he says warmly. “The car didn’t do anything.”

She finally relents, sighing. “Where does he  _ go?”  _ she asks. “When he disappears all day?”

“I’m not sure,” answers Herb. “I think he goes to a bar.”

“Why?” she asks cautiously, her anger fading to something else. Anxiety. “And he’d rather do that -- then spend time with me?”

Herb’s heart skips a beat. “Hollyhock --”

“I know you didn’t ask for this dorky seventeen-year-old to just show up at your door. And I’m sorry that I’m hurting your marriage --”

“No, Hollyhock, BJ, he’s…” He hesitates. “You’re not the problem.”

“Oh,” she mutters.”

“Look, I love BJ, but he can be shitty sometimes. And if he’s shitty, that’s just because he’s going through some stuff. You’re allowed to be mad at him, but whatever he does, you need to know that it’s not your fault.”

“I know.” She sighs. “I mean, I know, but I don’t always  _ know,  _ you know?” She rubs the back of her neck anxiously. “Like, sometimes I have this voice in the back of my head that goes, like, ‘Hey, everyone hates you! And they’re not wrong to feel that way!’”

Herb looks at the ground. “I know what you mean."

“That voice,” she asks cautiously. “The one that tells you you’re worthless and stupid and ugly?”

“Yeah?”

“It goes away, right?” She hesitates. “Like, it’s just a dumb teenage-girl thing, but then it goes away?”

Herb hesitates, but then looks up with a genuine smile. He doesn’t lie.

“It’s not just a dumb teenage-girl thing,” he says. “And it might stick around for a while, and you’ll have to figure out ways to deal with it. But eventually, yeah, it goes away.”

* * *

One bizarre series of misadventures later, BoJack learns what fracking is and why it’s bad. He learns it by listening to the bizarre drunken rants that Diane goes on after the two of them have, between them, drunk all of the alcohol that was in Mr. Peanutbutter’s house before a fracking-induced earthquake trapped them all underground.

“And honestly,” he continues. “He can shove his stupid Knicks up his cancerous and/or autistic ass!”

“What?” asks Diane.

“I swear to God,” rambles BoJack drunkenly. “The other day I broke a window and got cut up real bad, and while he was bandaging it up, he had the goddamn nerve to say, ‘Well, on the bright side, the Knicks are having a good season’. It’s so annoying! Every time things are completely hopeless, he acts like it’s fine just because they’re having a good season. What’s he gonna do when they’re having a bad season?”

“Get into baseball?” suggests Diane. She groans. “So are you part of the ‘marriage falling apart’ club?”

“Your marriage doesn’t seem that bad.”

“I’m trapped underground and it’s all my husband’s fault and I’m gonna die in this mansion in a mass grave with his ex-wives.”

There’s a long, ominous pause. 

“Okay,” says BoJack. “But on the bright side, Mr. Peanutbutter loves you, you got a cool job, you’ve got friends.”

“Jesus, you’re right.” Her eyes widen. “Even when I was above ground, I wasn’t satisfied. Oh my god. I’m the problem!” She starts violently sobbing into her hands. “Why can’t I be happy? Am I busted?”

“No,” begins BoJack. “It’s --”

“I am!” she yells. “I’m a  _ pit!  _ I’m a pit that good things fall into!”

“Diane, you’re not a pit --”

_ “I’m a pit!” _

BoJack places a hand on her shoulder as she continues to sob. Finally, she wipes her eyes, but she can’t manage to remove the mascara stains from her face. She sighs. “I can’t believe I’m crying. This is so dumb.”

“It’s okay,” says BoJack. “Don’t feel bad about feeling bad.”

She sniffles. “What about you, are you having a fight with Herb?”

He sighs. “Yeah, we’re kind of in a rough patch at the moment.”

“Did something happen, or …?”

He rubs the back of his neck nervously. “A couple weeks ago, Todd called me and said we had to come home. So we came back, and there was this girl there that’s apparently our daughter.”

“Oh,” says Diane.

“We’ve been together for more than twenty years and the girl’s seventeen. Herb thinks I must have cheated on him.”

Diane hesitates. “Did you?”

“Of course not!” He groans. “I have no idea how this could have happened. I know I can’t be her father, but we did a DNA test and we’re related.”

Diane’s eyes light up. “Maybe you’re, like, her uncle?”

“I was an only child, though.”

“That you know of.” She smirks. “I wrote your biography, I know how much your parents hated each other. How do you know you don’t have an illegitimate sibling somewhere out there?”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “That’s it!” he yells in triumph. “Once we’re out of here, if I can figure out who her  _ real  _ father is, I can prove that I didn’t cheat!”

“Great idea,” says Diane dryly. “Too bad you’ll probably be too hungover to remember it tomorrow.”

“Shit, you’re right.” He groans. “I’ll write it down, that should fix it.”

* * *

Somewhere around the third day underground, nobody has a phone with a battery that hasn’t died, so all BoJack can do is shoot Herb one more text (because  _ yes,  _ they’re fighting, and  _ yeah,  _ Herb’s being a right shithead right now, but he’ll be damned if he continues this petty getting-Hollyhock-to-pass-on-a-message thing while he’s potentially dying underground) before his phone dies and hope the news covers it.

Despite all the arguments, he’s not surprised when the yellow Tesla is right outside the remains of Mr. Peanutbutter’s house when help finally arrives. Hollyhock’s even been nice enough to climb into the back so that he can have the passenger seat. He sits down and does up his seatbelt, looking out the window.

“I’m  _ so  _ glad you’re okay,” says Herb.

“Yeah,” mutters BoJack.

Herb’s face falls. “BJ, I said I was sorry.”

“And I said, I don’t forgive you.” Herb opens his mouth for a counter-argument but BoJack continues before he can say anything, “What are you sorry  _ for,  _ anyway?”

Herb’s eyes widen slightly, taken aback. “For … saying you were bound to cheat on me.”

“But you still  _ think  _ that, don’t you?” Herb doesn’t answer. “What’s the point of apologising for  _ saying  _ it if you still  _ believe  _ it?”

“Of course I still believe you cheated on me,” snaps Herb. “The daughter is kind of a dead giveaway.”

“That didn’t actually answer my question.”

“Oh my God,” moans Hollyhock. “Can you two  _ please  _ not? Just for one minute?”

Herb sighs loudly, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. He glances over at BoJack, and frowns. “What’s that writing on your arm?”

“Err…” He stares at it. “I must have done it while I was drunk. I don’t remember writing it.”

“Well, what does it say?”

BoJack rolls up his sleeve and squints. The writing is nearly illegible -- yep, he was definitely drunk at the time -- but he can just barely read it. “It says …  _ Important!!!  _ _ Do not forget! Hollyhock uncle maybe?” _

“What does that mean?” asks Hollyhock.

“I don’t know, do you have an uncle?”

“Of course I have uncles, I have eight dads. What does that have to do with you getting drunk underground?”

“I dunno,” says BoJack. “Eh, if I can’t remember it, it probably wasn’t important.”


	15. What Time Was It When It Happened?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hollyhock collapses and BoJack and Herb aren't sure why. When they finally figure out what happened, BoJack blames himself.

Herb once again pinches the bridge of his nose. It’s all a very choreographed routine. “If you didn’t cheat on me,” he asks, maintaining the illusion of calmness. “Then where did Hollyhock come from?”

“Jesus, Herb, I don’t know!” BoJack’s voice rises to a shout. “Maybe the DNA test was wrong somehow, maybe we’re some sort of distant cousins or something! Why can’t you just  _ trust  _ me?!”

“Well, there’s not exactly a lot of other explanations!” yells Herb back. He groans in exasperation. “Every time you lie, it just makes me angrier. You do know that, right? And one of these days you’ll have to admit it, and --”

“Shut up!” yells BoJack suddenly, his ears perking up.

Herb, of course, takes offense to this. “Yeah, sure,  _ shut up.  _ That  _ really  _ sounds like something people say when they’re winning an argument.”

“No, I mean  _ shut up,  _ I think I heard something.”

Herb frowns and stays quiet for a few moments, but the sound doesn’t repeat. “What was it?”

“A sort of thud,” answers BoJack. “Like something falling. I think it was in the kitchen?”

“It was probably nothing.”

“Still, we’d better check.” He exits the room swiftly and goes down to the kitchen, and Herb, with an exasperated sigh, follows him. He catches up a few moments after BoJack gets to the kitchen, and for a second he can’t seem to see what’s going on -- BoJack is blocking most of the view, and he refuses to move, frozen in shock.

Then he sees it.

“Shit,” he mumbles under his breath.

Hollyhock is lying on the kitchen floor.

Her eyes are closed, her hair is a complete mess, and she’s scarily unmoving. Herb quickly pushes past BoJack and places a few fingers on her neck. “She has a pulse.”

“I’ll call an ambulance,” says BoJack, taking out his phone.

* * *

BoJack continues to pace furiously. Herb, as the one with more tact and ability to remember things, is designated as the talker, while BoJack is left to spend most of the time pacing anxiously around the waiting room.

“Hollyhock,” repeats Herb, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice.

“And her last name?” asks the receptionist.

“Manheim-Mannhiem, uh…” He pales. “Just … give us any information you can on the seventeen-year-old girl that came here by ambulance fifteen minutes ago.”

“Seriously?” chokes BoJack. “You can remember a very specific conversation we had seventeen years ago, but not the girl’s name?!”

“I’ve been distracted,” says Herb defensively. “You try remembering eight surnames when you’re busy fighting with your husband!”

“Manheim-Manheim-Guerrero-Robinson-Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack.”

He lists the names off as though it’s second nature, as though he’s spent day and night practicing for this moment. Herb’s jaw drops. 

“What’s your excuse?”

“I, um…” mumbles Herb weakly. “Well, I … “

The receptionist sighs. “Are you her legal guardians?”

“No,” says Herb. “but we’re not leaving this room until we know what’s happened.”

“Have a seat.”

However reluctantly, they do so.

“You remembered,” says Herb.

“You forgot.” 

“Jesus, BJ, how did you remember? I’ve been so distracted by us arguing that I could barely remember her first name sometimes.”

BoJack glares. “Some of us can’t just act like the goddamn Knicks are the most important thing in the world, and when everything goes to shit we have to find something that actually  _ matters  _ to keep us going.”

Herb leans back in his seat. “I’m sorry.”

“I know.” BoJack replies. “What time was it?”

“Hmm?”

“When she collapsed?”

“I … don’t know,” mutters Herb. “I remember thinking it was odd when she hadn’t come in to tell us to stop yelling at each other, but I didn’t worry about it until you heard the thud.”

_ “It was odd when she hadn’t come in to tell us to stop yelling at each other,”  _ mimics BoJack in a mocking tone, but he quickly gives up and sighs. “No. No point in making fun of you for it. That’s why  _ I  _ was worried about the thud, too.”

“Did we really let it get that far?” asks Herb anxiously. “To the point where we only remembered she existed because she wasn’t trying to stop us from fighting?”

BoJack’s mind flickers back to the ride home from soccer practice, the time his father picked him up some two and a half hours late. The rant about how he was having a great run on his novel, and then he thought about how that  _ never  _ happens because normally his  _ stupid  _ son is in the way, and then he remembered that nobody had picked the son of a bitch up.

_ You’re just like him. _

BoJack says nothing.

* * *

It’s some two hours later when they finally hear her name. There’s a group of eight men talking in hushed voices about someone named Hollyhock. Herb and BoJack inquire after her, and each of the men introduces themself in an over-the-top, comedic manner.

“How’s Hollyhock?” asks BoJack hurriedly as soon as Quackers McQuack is done introducing himself. “They wouldn’t give us any information --”

“Why would they?!” yells one of her fathers. “You two are part of the reason!”

There’s a long, ominous silence as the eight men stand there, fuming. Herb gulps. “What happened?”

“Amphetamine overdose,” spits one of them. “She tried to  _ kill herself.” _

The words have an immediate effect. BoJack physically staggers back a few steps as though he’s been pushed violently, and leans on a nearby wall to steady himself against the room’s spinning. Herb’s hands go to his mouth in shock as his face loses all of its colour, and finally he speaks up, “Oh my God, we had no idea.”

“Well, maybe you  _ should  _ have,” snaps a man.

“Get out of here,” yells another. “Both of you, get out of here. We never want to see your disgusting faces again.”

They don’t need telling twice.

* * *

Another packet of ibuprofen hits the floor and Herb groans. “I just don’t see what she could have used!” With an annoyed sigh, he starts to pile the mundane, unopened medication back into the bathroom cupboard. He turns behind him and his eyes widen. ‘Jesus, BJ, you look like  _ shit.” _

BoJack lets out a long, shaky breath. “I’m fine, just --” The sentence dissolves into a mess of unclear stuttering as he trembles like a leaf, fighting for a full breath of air. Herb had told him to sit down on a stool in an attempt to let him calm down and stop shaking so badly, but evidently it’s not working.

“No, you’re not fine. You need to breathe.” He places his hands on BoJack’s shoulders. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

_ “How?!”  _ chokes BoJack, pushing Herb away as though he poses a physical threat. “We spent  _ months  _ making  _ no  _ effort to hide how much we were fighting! She thought it was her fault! We  _ made  _ her think it was her fault, and we kept at it until she thought she should just  _ die  _ because all she does it cause problems!” He moans. “We are acting  _ just like  _ my parents!”

Herb winces, as though unsure how to refute the argument, but quickly regains his composure and says, “It’s okay, we can still fix this.”

“How?!”

“Well, we can start by figuring out what she OD’d on. That might help the doctors, if nothing else.” He continues to dig through the bathroom cupboard, finding nothing that has been opened or emptied, and then frowns. “Why do we even  _ have  _ this?”

“What?” asks BoJack.

Herb, as answer, takes out a large container of weight loss pills. BoJack’s heart skips several beats. He tries to think of a response, but the look of horror etched on his face tells Herb all he needs to know. 

“...Are these yours?”

BoJack is silent for a long time. “...Yeah.”

Herb’s face falls. “Why?”

“I wanted to lose weight,” answers BoJack.

“BJ…” His name comes out as a sigh. “You  _ know  _ that’s not healthy.”

“Neither’s being a fat piece of shit,” says BoJack, avoiding eye contact.

“You’re not a fat piece of shit,” says Herb, frowning. “There’s nothing wrong with your body. You don’t need to take these pills, okay?”

“Shit.” BoJack puts his head in his hands. “This is all my fault.”

“Hey, thinking like that won’t help anything.” He places a hand on BoJack’s shoulder. “You know, maybe it’s also my fault.”

“Yeah,” deadpans BoJack. “None of this would have happened if you hadn’t pulled me out of that wretched pool.”

Herb doesn’t think this is very funny.

“BJ, you don’t mean that.”

“I  _ do.”  _ His voice breaks as he talks. “All I do is hurt people. I can’t be happy, I, I-I--” 

For the second time in a good thirty years of knowing him, Herb watches, uncertain, as BoJack breaks down sobbing. “I want to  _ die.” _

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, it’s gonna be okay.” He wraps his arms around BoJack tightly, holding him as he sobs. “We’re going to figure this out, okay?”

“H-How?” chokes BoJack through his sobs. 

“It’s gonna be okay, we’ll find a way to fix this. Just breathe. Come on, breathe.” 

It takes several minutes of soothing words and gentle touches to calm BoJack down, but he finally manages to take several deep breaths. “Thanks,” he murmurs. 

“Anyway,” says Herb. “What I was trying to say was that maybe this is also my fault. For not trusting you.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “You mean … ?”

“I don’t know  _ what  _ I believe anymore. I don’t see how Hollyhock could possibly exist unless you did cheat on me. But, I should have tried to figure things out instead of just accusing you. I let it turn into me against you, when it should have been us against the problem.”

“Thanks,” mumbles BoJack. “It … means a lot to hear you say that.”

“And another thing.” BoJack looks up and he continues. “I can’t stress how sorry I am for that shit I said when we first had the big fight about it. I didn’t mean any of what I said.”

“Any of it?” BoJack raises an eyebrow. “Because, I mean, you  _ did  _ have a point about how being annoyed that gay people can adopt is kinda homophobic.” After a moment, he adds, “Sorry about telling you to shove it up your cancerous and/or autistic ass.”

“You’re forgiven, I actually thought it was pretty funny. Would make a great band name.” He clears his throat. “I meant the other stuff. You know, about how … about how you were bound to cheat on me.”

BoJack stiffens. “Oh.”

“I … don’t know what to think anymore, about any of this. But if you did cheat on me … then it had nothing to do with you being bi.”

“Took Hollyhock nearly dying for you to realise that, huh?” asks BoJack, raising an eyebrow. “So what’s your new conspiracy theory for my motivation?”

“I don’t know,” says Herb. “Why does anybody cheat on anybody? Maybe it’s some of that Horseman gunk floating around on your brain. I bet Butterscotch cheated on Beatrice a few times.”

BoJack’s eyes widen and he leaps to his feet. “Herb, that’s it!  _ That’s  _ what I realised when I was underground!”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Uh, what?”

“It’s a long story. I’ll explain in the car. Come on!”

He races off, and Herb can do nothing but follow.

* * *

“So basically,” he pants. “The whole time she’s staying with me, it doesn’t make sense, right? I’m meant to be her father, but I didn’t have sex with a woman in the right timeframe to concieve her.”

“Well,” says one of Hollyhock’s fathers. “That’s an extremely cisnormative way of looking at things.”

“No,” says BoJack. “What I’m saying is, who is the uterus-haver that birthed her, right? That’s why Hollyhock came to L.A. in the first place. But then I thought, what if I’m not her father?”

“You’re not her father,” says one of her dads.

“We’re her fathers.”

“You’re her fathers, yeah, I know, I know. Eight of you, you each have your own cute thing, I get it. My point is, Hollyhock and I have the same DNA, but that doesn’t mean I’m her father.”

“You’re not. Because being a father isn’t just --”

“God, I feel like you are wilfully misunderstanding me. What I am saying is, I’m not even her father biologically.”

Eight jaws drop.

“You see,” explains BoJack. “It all started when I realised my father could have cheated on my mother without me knowing, and I could be her uncle, or something. Only problem is, my dad’s dead. So, I was planning to go around checking a bunch of birth certificates in the hope of finding her -- when I remembered that my mother has dementia.”

“That sounds like a really tough parenting situation,” says one of them.

“Honestly, they’re better like this. Here’s the thing -- my mom calls my husband Butterscotch, which was my dad’s name, and that’s something I normally try not to think too hard about because it involves, like, five layers of incest. But I thought maybe I could use that to my advantage to figure out what she was so pissed at dad about before he died.”

“And then you found out?” asks one of her dads.

“No, didn’t work, because she was pissed at my dad for a lot of reasons. But then I remember, wait, she thinks I’m some bitch named Henrietta. Who even is Henrietta? I didn’t know, but I know how my mom works, so I kept pissing her off until she yelled out ‘my’ full name -- which, by the way, brought back some  _ horrifying  _ memories, so you’re welcome.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“Did you .. ?”

“Yeah. Her name’s Henrietta Platchkey. I messaged her on Facebook and, yeah, she gave up a horse girl for adoption on Hollyhock’s birthday. They have the same diamond and everything, it all checks out.”

One of her fathers stares at him with wide eyes. “You did all that?”

“She has to know.” His voice takes on a pleading tone. “You don't have to tell her I was here. I'll stay out of her life forever. You can tell her I'm an asshole. Say you found this on your own. I don't care, but you have to tell her.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Please.”

* * *

He clings to the phone like it’s his lifeline.  _ She doesn’t hate you. For some reason, she doesn’t hate you. And she knows about Henrietta. _

_ Maybe you’ve fixed this. _

“Anyway,” mumbles Hollyhock. “they're about to start boarding, so…”

BoJack sighs. “Hollyhock, I'm sorry I didn't take better care of you.”

“I shouldn't have moved in with you. It was maybe too much too fast.”

“Yeah.”

“But it wasn't all bad,” she says brightly. “I mean, yeah, I spent months believing I was personally responsible for ruining your marriage and your lives to the point where I wanted to kill myself so I would stop causing problems, but other than that, it was a pretty chill experience.”

“I should have protected you.” Even now that he’s found her mother, he can’t stop the guilt from leaking out. “I really wanted to be a good dad to you, Hollyhock.”

“Well, turns out you're not my dad at all.”

“Yeah. Good thing, I guess.”

“Yeah. Good thing.”

“So, uh, Minneapolis, huh?” He clears his throat. “Did you rent a car or a cab?”

“BoJack, it's all taken care of. I gotta go.”

“Is there anything, uh, I can do?” he presses. “I can upgrade your seats, or, or send you better fruit.”

She sighs audibly. “BoJack, look, I never needed you to be a dad. I'm going to be fine. I told you from the beginning, I have eight dads.”

His face falls. “Yeah.”

There’s a long pause. 

“But I’ve never had a brother.”

BoJack’s eyes light up. He’s never had a sister either. 

But, there’s a first time for everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> honestly, bojack horseman is one of THOSE shows that is so good that I can literally list on one hand the amount of things I dislike about it, but one of my main gripes has always been that bojacks body image issues are never actually addressed seriously which is weird because basically every other issue in the show is taken pretty seriously at some point(except herb's peanut allergy). my other main gripe is that we never find out how Beatrice was drugging hollyhock -- where did she get the weight loss pills? did this goddamn senile woman just walk into the shops and buy some and nobody raised an eyebrow? did nobody think that was weird?
> 
> so naturally, ive had this theory/headcanon for a while that BJ had the pills in his house in an attempt to lose weight and thats how Beatrice found them. naturally I made it happen in this au!


	16. Another Series of Gay Vignettes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack's life with Herb as he begins working on a new series, Philbert.

The mattress bounces under his weight as he slumps down onto the bed. “This show  _ sucks.” _

“Normally this is the part where I tell you that it’s not  _ that  _ bad, but, well…”

BoJack groans. “I don’t know  _ anything  _ about my character. What’s his  _ deal?” _

“Who’re you playing again?”

“This weird-ass detective guy called Philbert -- which, by the way is a stupid-ass name. The story makes no sense, my co-star’s super distant and won't be my friend, and her entire character is just gratuitous and male-gazey.”

“Well…” Herb tries to look on the bright side. “Is Diane doing well, at least? I haven't seen much of her since the divorce.”

“Eh, she's okay. She's got this cool haircut, really brings out her neck.” He groans. “I don't know  _ how  _ I let Princess Carolyn rope me into doing  _ Philbert.  _ It's the stupidest show I've ever seen. Besides, I…” He sighs. “I don't know, I don't  _ like  _ the cameras right now.”

Herb frowns. “What do you mean?”

“Like…” He turns away, suddenly feeling exposed. “I feel like all my fans are gonna be  _ laughing,  _ you know? Like, ‘wow, he  _ really  _ let himself go’.”

“Come on, BJ, don't think like that.” He places a hand on his shoulder. “There's nothing wrong with your body.”

“Everyone says that,” says BoJack. “But I just don’t  _ feel  _ it, you know? No matter what, I just feel all fat and gross.”

“Thinking like that is a  _ habit.  _ If you get into the habit of thinking differently, you’ll feel better. Just give it time.”

BoJack sighs. “Yeah. I guess so.”

* * *

“Existence is pain and life is meaningless.”

Herb winces sympathetically. “Tough day at work?”

“They want a  _ nude scene.  _ Of  _ me.”  _

“Good, I needed a reason to watch that shitshow when it’s finished.”

“No, not good,” insists BoJack. “People are going to see what I look like. This is the worst thing that could ever happen.”

“...Well, I wouldn’t say it’s the  _ worst thing that could ever happen…” _

“It  _ is,”  _ he moans. “I would  _ literally  _ prefer if we had the Holocaust every four years like the olympics. I would take that over this scene.”

“Okay, yeah, you’re  _ definitely  _ being overdramatic now.” Herb sighs. “Isn’t there some sort of whacky scheme you can get up to to get the scene cut?”

“I tried to get Todd to be the janitor so he could do some secret agent stuff, but he was so overqualified they moved him straight to a super high-up position. “ He groans. “This is the  _ worst.” _

“Hey, look on the bright side.” At BoJack’s raised eyebrow, he elaborates. “The Knicks are having a good season.”

“That does not help me at all!”

“Well…” He places a hand on BoJack’s shoulder. “Maybe you should see this as an opportunity. You know, to feel better about yourself.”

“Yeah,” snarks BoJack. “I’ll feel  _ real  _ great about myself when it comes out and everyone laughs their asses off at how fat I am.”

“Or  _ maybe  _ you’ll feel better when it comes out and everyone thinks you’re sexy as shit.”

“...Honestly, that would just make me feel  _ weird,”  _ mutters BoJack.

“Trust me, you’ve got some really  _ interested  _ fans. It is  _ so  _ easy to find porn of you.”

BoJack gives him a look.

“...What? You’ve been busy lately.”

“Oh my God.” 

Unfortunately, Todd currently lives with Princess Carolyn, and therefore is unavailable to come in with a distraction and an excuse to change the subject. There’s several moments of long silence.

“Do you want to watch  _ Horsin’ Around?”  _ asks Herb.

“Yeah, that sounds good.”

* * *

For the first time since the beginning of  _ Philbert’s  _ production, he comes home from work with an uncharacteristic spring in his step and the first thing he says isn’t a complaint. “Gina and I are finally starting to be friends.”

“Gina?” asks Herb.

“Gina Cazador. She plays Sassy. Anyway, today I found out she’s super into musicals, so naturally, I made fun of her for it.”

Herb sighs. “Let me guess, you went too far and hurt her feelings, apologised, did the same thing again, apologised again, and tried to surprise her by making her sing which predictably backfired, and then apologised for that and now you’re friends?”

BoJack chuckles. “You know me so well. Can we watch  _ Horsin’ Around?” _

Herb grimaces.

“What?” asks BoJack.

“We’ve watched  _ Horsin’ Around  _ every day for the last three weeks,” says Herb. “Can’t we … I don’t know, try another show?”

“Pfft,  _ another show,”  _ scoffs BoJack, as though it’s the most absurd thing he’s ever heard. “Name  _ one  _ show that isn’t  _ Horsin’ Around.” _

“Uh, there are  _ definitely  _ other shows. Can we just  _ try  _ something else?”

BoJack sighs emphatically. “Fine.  _ One  _ episode and if I’m not impressed, back to  _ Horsin’ Around.” _

* * *

He takes a swig of a clear liquid that probably isn’t water, from a bottle labeled  _ MONDAY,  _ and Herb frowns. “Is it safe to mix alcohol with those meds?”

“Don’t know, don’t care,” answers BoJack. “I swear to God, it was  _ terrifying  _ when I fell off that building. I was  _ sure  _ I was a goner.” He shudders at the thought. “Never doing a stunt again.”

There’s a long, painful silence. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” asks Herb.

“Just did. Fell off a building, scary as shit, hurt like hell. No more talking needed.”

“No, I mean…” He gulps. “Beatrice.”

“Oh yeah, I got a free churro on the way to the funeral.”

Herb gives him a look. 

“Fine,” says BoJack, crossing his arms like a young child. “I … don’t know what to think, I guess? I think a part of me still had this crazy idea that at the last minute she was going to turn everything around and apologise for being such a shithead.” He forces a laugh at himself. “But now she can’t bother me anymore. That’s something, at least.”

Herb stares at him with wide eyes, as though waiting for the other shoe to drop. “You’re taking this remarkably well.”

“Eh. Honestly, the time in the intensive care unit was worse than the actual funeral.” At Herb’s raised eyebrow, he adds, “The last thing she said to me was ‘I see you’, and I don’t know what she meant, or if that’s even what she was saying -- there was a sign behind me that said ‘ICU’, she could have just been reading it. Honestly, I don’t know how to interpret it and I don’t want to know. I’ve spent enough of my life trying to figure her out. And I didn’t say anything to her, so it was really quiet and tense.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” asks Herb.

“Remember when we did that whole crazy-ass thing to figure out who Hollyhock’s mother was?” 

“...Yeah?”

“Well, I don’t think she knew who I was, but just as I was leaving, I turned to her and I said, ‘One more thing:  _ Fuck  _ you, mom’. And I was pretty satisfied with those being my last words to her, so I didn’t want to ruin it.”

Herb frowns. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Course not. My mom just died, I’m not  _ sure  _ of anything. But I’ll let you know if I’m not okay.”

Herb smiles. “Okay.”

* * *

“And we were  _ finally  _ starting to be friends, too!” He groans. “Now I’m gonna be back to stupid-ass awkward silence between scenes.”

Herb frowns. “Can’t you talk to other actors? Or the crew, or … ?”

“We’re the only two main characters, so everyone else comes and goes, and the crew is always super busy.”

“What’s she upset with you about, anyway?”

BoJack grins. “Funny story, that is. We somehow ended up talking about video games, and I said that  _ Digimon  _ is better than  _ Pokemon.  _ She gave me this absolutely  _ disgusted  _ look, and said, ‘What the  _ fuck  _ is wrong with you?’ and she hasn’t spoken to me since, except when we’re filming.”

Herb’s eyes widen. “That’s a really stupid reason to stop talking to someone.”

“Heh, you’re telling me.”

“...She’s got a point, though.  _ Pokemon  _ is objectively better.”

“Sure, Herb, whatever you say.” 

“You know I’m right. How’s your back?”

BoJack winces. “Still hurts like hell. The meds aren’t helping much.”

Herb frowns. “Aren’t you meant to … I don’t know, do something about that? Get the prescription adjusted?”

“Yeah, probably. I’ll do it later.” An annoying instrumental version of the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ theme fills the room. “God dammit, that had  _ better  _ be Gina calling to apologise for acting like a goddamned brat.” He checks his phone, and his jaw drops. “Holy shit.”

“Who is it?” asks Herb anxiously.

“...It’s Sarah Lynn.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember that unofficial rule I set up for myself that I mentioned in the note after chapter 6 (Escape to L.A.)? the one where every character that says "fuck" in canon has to in the fic (except Herb) and it has to signify their relationship with BJ being permanently damaged?
> 
> yeah well. gina is VERY into Pokémon and so yes, her relationship with BJ is permanently damaged.
> 
> oh, whats that? you want him to actually do something shitty to justify her cutting him off?
> 
> well, consider: gina is one of my favourite characters and it would break my goddamn heart to make BoJack strangle her


	17. That's Too Much, Man!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Attending an AA meeting for the first time since she woke up from her two-year coma, Sarah Himmelfarb tells the story of how BoBo the Angsty Zebra* and his husband Jerb Pizzaz ran into trouble at the party she threw to celebrate waking up.
> 
> *names changed for privacy, and also because the last time name-dropping was allowed in AA meetings she got dragged to Ohio

All eyes turn to face her. She stands in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe, once again managing to attract attention by her mere presence. For just a second, from the way she grins like she owns the place and she knows  _ exactly  _ what’s going on, it seems like nothing’s changed at all. But things  _ have  _ changed -- that’s obvious from her reply when the silence is finally broken. 

“Sarah Lynn?”

“What?” she replies in mock confusion. “I don’t know a Sarah Lynn! No, I’m Sarah Himmelfarb -- but you can call me Sarah.” At their raised eyebrows, she adds, “Everyone kinda forgot about me when there was no news on me for two years, so I’m gonna lay low for a bit, you know?” 

She takes a seat in the circle, ignoring the collective gasps of everyone else in the room, and dramatically turns her head so that everyone can see her hair. At first, it’s easy to miss the change, but they quickly see the shaved section of the right-hand side of her hair. 

“What is  _ up,  _ guys?” she asks, gesturing wildly. “You all staying sober? Breaking the terrifying cycle of  _ drinking, lifting your head up, drinking, lifting your head up?  _ Whoo, I’ve missed a few meetings!”

“You have,” says one person, the one sitting across from her, audibly stunned. “You haven’t attended AA in a while.”

“Yeah,” explains Sarah, beginning to list off the points on her fingers. “Well, you see, I had to get a haircut --” she runs a hand through her undercut -- “and then I had to legally change my name back to Sarah Himmelfarb, and after that I spent six weeks in rehab -- and, oh, I was in a coma for two years.”

Everyone stares at her in stunned silence.

“Anyway,” she continues. “I have got a  _ hell  _ of a story to tell today! After I got out of rehab, I wanted to have a party to celebrate my sobriety -- but then I realised I’d missed, like, two birthdays, two Christmases, two New Years, and a bunch of other shit. So I thought, why not celebrate it all at once with one  _ big  _ party!” At their concerned looks, she adds, “Don’t worry, there was no alcohol or drugs.”

“How was the party?” asks one other person.

“Great question!” She leans back in her chair. “It was nice getting to catch up with all my friends. But there was, like, a  _ whole  _ thing that happened with a couple friends in particular.”

“Which friends?”

“Uh…” She grimaces. “I dunno, the last time we were allowed to use people’s  _ actual  _ names when we talk about them in AA, I got dragged to Ohio. So, for the sake of the argument, this is a story about … BoBo the Angsty Zebra and Jerb Pizzaz.”

* * *

Jerb Pizzaz let out a long sigh. “I just don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Relax, Jerb,” said his husband, BoBo the Angsty Zebra. “She’ll be fine.”

Jerb continued to drive along in the Tesla, frowning. “But she  _ just  _ got out of a coma that was  _ caused  _ by this kind of lifestyle, and now she’s partying again?”

“Trust me, she’s sober,” muttered BoBo, wincing slightly. She just got out of rehab. Besides, we can’t just  _ not  _ visit her when she just woke up from a two-year coma. I …” He gulps. “I need to apologise to her.”

“So do I, honestly. And I think we owe her two birthday presents.”

* * *

“Hang on,” asks one member of the AA meeting. “If this is a story you’re telling, why are you starting it from someone else’s point of view?”

“It’s called  _ drama,”  _ scoffs Sarah.

“And why is BoBo wincing slightly?”

Sarah groans. “I was  _ going  _ to set up for a mildly dramatic reveal, but: He got his back injured in a stunt gone wrong at work. He’s an actor.”

“Wow,” says one audience member. “What was he filming? Anything famous?”

Sarah hesitates. “...It’s a kind of indie TV show. For the website  _ WhatTimeIsItRightNow.com.” _

“Yeah, but what’s the show called?”

* * *

_“Pillbert,”_ said BoBo the Angsty Zebra, for no readily apparent reason.

“Huh?” asked Sarah.

_“Pillbert._ It’s the name of the show I’m working on.”

“Wow,” said Sarah. “I didn’t realise you were still into shows. The last time you did one was, like, 2007.”

BoBo shuddered. “We do  _ not  _ talk about  _ The BoBo the Angsty Zebra Show. _ The last  _ real  _ show I did was  _ Stripin’ Around,  _ which, as you know, was the sitcom that you and I starred in in the 90s, along with Joette and Brady.”

“I made it!” said Jerb unnecessarily.

“Anyway,” said Sarah. “Joette and Brady are over near the Christmas tree, if you want to talk to them.”

“Why would I?” asked BoBo.

“I don’t know, maybe to yell about Silver Blaze? Brady’s pissed that he lost their Sherlock Holmes trivia game slash pillow fight a couple years back, so they’re having a rematch.”

“Wait, seriously? God, I hope Joette’s finally learned about what happened to Silver Blaze. Besides, I should probably leave Brady alone. I haven’t talked to him since I ruined  _ Ethan Around.” _

Sarah gave him a blank stare. “What’s  _ Ethan Around?” _

BoBo chuckled nervously. “The  _ Stripin’ Around  _ spinoff Brady wanted to make. I agreed to do it after you OD’d, then … things kinda fell apart.”

“Fell apart?” asked Jerb. “You literally had a panic attack halfway through an episode, left the set, and ignored all of Brady’s calls.”

“Yeah, that’s more reason for him to be pissed at me. Best to avoid him for a bit.”

Sarah groaned emphatically. “I feel like you’re just talking about the shows you did, and the shows you tried to do and then ruined. What about your actual, y’know,  _ life?” _

BoBo grimaced.

“Eh, enough about me, how have you been?”

“I just got out of a two-year coma, not much is new with me. What about you? Come on, you’ve  _ got  _ to have some cool stuff that’s happened in the last two years.”

There was a long, painful silence.

“...Hey,” said BoBo, conveniently noticing something. “Is that a pinata?”

“Oh yeah,” explained Sarah. “It’s to make up for the birthdays I missed.”

“...Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go burst that pinata!”

* * *

A stylised paper-mache horse exploded violently, and BoBo the Angsty Zebra scrambled to gather the candy that fell to the floor before he could think twice about it. The sudden movement as he bent over caused him to grunt at the pain in his back, but he forced himself to crouch and grab some. He held up an unwrapped, half-melted chocolate bar and his face fell.

“This is just candy.”

“Well,  _ duh!”  _ laughed Sarah, unwrapping a candy bar. “This  _ is  _ meant to be a birthday party!”

“Your last birthday party had a pinata, though, and it did  _ not  _ have candy.”

“Relax!” She hit him in the back in what was supposed to be a friendly gesture, but the pained look on his face seemed to indicate that he didn’t find it very friendly. “I’m sober now.”

“Sober as in sober?” asked BoBo. “Or sober as in ‘I have an absurdly large amount of drugs in my house, but don’t worry, I’m not going to take them, I’m saving for when someone asks me to party’?”

“Sober as in  _ sober.”  _ She gave him a genuine smile. “When I woke up and remembered that happened at the planetarium, I realised I had to make some serious changes in my life. So I changed my name back to Sarah Himmelfarb, got a haircut, and threw out all of my drugs. I’m a changed woman now.”

“I …” said BoBo. “am also a changed man.” He forced a grin. “I’m down to only one bottle of vodka a day!”

Sarah’s eyes widened. “That’s a lot. Like, you do realise that’s still a lot?”

“Yeah, but by my standards, I’m basically sober.” He took an orange pill bottle out of his pocket and poured a handful of tablets into his hand, then swallowed them with ease. She gave him a look. “Don’t worry, these are prescription.”

“Yeah, but … are you meant to have that many at once?  _ And  _ alcohol? I heard mixing meds with alcohol can be, like,  _ really  _ bad.”

“Eh, I’ll be fine.” He put the remaining pills back in his pocket. 

Sarah gave him a concerned look, but said nothing more on the matter. “So anyway, how’s your life been for the last two years?”

“...Hey, I think Joette’s getting something about Silver Blaze wrong.”

* * *

One of the AA members gulps. “It sounds like he’s addicted to the painkillers.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” says Sarah. “He kept taking them while we were partying, and I told him I thought it was too much, but he kept saying it was okay because it was prescribed. Eventually, I had to pull out the big guns.”

* * *

She tapped Jerb on the shoulder. “Psst,” she muttered in a hushed tone. “How many of those painkillers is BoBo meant to take in a day?”

The look Jerb gave her seemed to indicate that he knew exactly what was going on. “Three.” He sighed. “How many has he taken?”

“Uh, I’m not sure. He takes whole handfuls at once so it’s hard to tell exactly how many. But, like, definitely more than that.”

Jerb’s eyes widened. “If he keeps that up he’ll end up in hospital before the night’s up … or worse.” He shook his head. “I’ll go talk to him.”

“Wait, no.” He turned to leave but she grabbed his shoulder before he could. “I’ll talk to him.” At his raised eyebrow, she added, “Please, let me do it. You’ve never been an addict. I know what it feels like.”

“...Okay.” He sighed anxiously. “Be careful, okay?”

“I will,” she answered. “You, uh, might wanna give him some space until I’ve had a chance to talk to him. If he thinks you told me to, he’ll lash out.”

“Good idea. You know,” he muttered. “I think I might have left my phone at home.”

“Really? I saw you had it earlier --”

Jerb winked at her. “Tell him I’ll be back soon.” The implications finally washed over her, and she shot him a wink before he left.

* * *

“So did you talk to BoBo?”

“I’m getting there, I’m getting there,” she insists. “After I talked to Jerb, I went to go see BoBo. Problem is, he was getting involved in the Sherlock Holmes trivia game slash pillow fight. And it was  _ really  _ competitive.”

* * *

“You,” yelled BoBo drunkenly. “Are the living embodiment of dead grass!”

“Go shove a cactus up your ass!” yelled back Joette.

Sarah grimaced as BoBo stumbled around. That was  _ definitely  _ too many meds, and possibly also more than the one bottle of vodka a day, too. This was the point where she would normally be taking him home -- but he was an adult, not a high school kid, and besides, Jerb had the car.

“Okay, everyone,” she announced. “Calm down!” The room fell silent. “Okay, what are you arguing about?”

“The red-headed men’s league,” said Brady smugly. “These two haven’t even read it.”

“That’s because  _ The Adventure of Silver Blaze  _ is objectively better!” half-slurred BoBo. 

“God,” muttered Sarah, shaking her head. “I feel like a dick sucked by a dumb shit. I leave you three alone for two minutes and you’re already fighting? Come  _ on,  _ people, if we could film a show together then we can be civil for a day!”

Brady grimaced. “Sarah, we worked together, like, twenty years ago, and all of us except BoBo were kids. A lot’s changed since then.”

“You know,” said Joette. “Maybe it’s for the best that we don’t get together that often. We’d most likely drive each other mad.”

BoBo forced a laugh. “Well, nobody knows how to get under your skin like family.”

Brady gave him a look. “We’re not a  _ family _ , we’re just, like, ex-coworkers. And knowing what always happens with actors being cancelled, I won’t be surprised if the next time we’re together is because someone gets ridiculously high and does something regrettable.”

Three pairs of eyes turned to face Sarah.

“...Why are you all looking at me?”

“...Well,” muttered Joette uneasily. “You  _ are  _ addicted to basically everything under the sun…”

“You  _ did  _ stab yourself with a rusty bayonet once…”

“Honestly,” said BoBo the Angsty Zebra. “I’m so high, I can’t tell  _ where  _ I’m looking.” At everyone’s concerned looks, he quickly added, “But it’s prescription, so it’s okay.”

Sarah gulped. “Actually, BoBo, I’ve been meaning to talk to you. How’s your life been, in the last two years? I bet  _ loads  _ has happened.”

But of course, Brady had to interrupt. 

“BoBo’s been a real dick lately, thanks for asking. He  _ ruined  _ my  _ Ethan Around  _ show, twice.”

“In my defense,” said BoBo. “the first time was Princess Carolyn’s fault.”

“What about the second time?!” demanded Brady. “You just  _ walked out!  _ Ignored  _ all  _ my calls, wouldn’t answer my emails -- I even tried calling Jerb to get hold of you, but he said you were in Michigan having a mental health day!”

“Mental health days are important,” interjected Sarah.

“I thought so too, so I gave him some time -- but I called again six months later, and Jerb said they were  _ still  _ in Michigan.” He glares at BoBo. “What were you  _ doing?!” _

BoBo’s features hardened. “Okay, you know what?” he snarled. “You  _ really  _ wanna know what happened?”

“You don’t have to tell him,” said Sarah hurriedly. “It’s your choice whether you want to --”

“I walked out on set, got Jerb to pick me up, went home, and I  _ tried to kill myself.”  _ He gave them a second for the words to sink in, then continued. “Then Jerb basically took me prisoner in Michigan so he knew I wouldn’t try again, and I  _ acted  _ like he was being overprotective, but let’s face it, it was a  _ necessary precaution.” _

“Jesus,” mumbled Joette. Sarah wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like Jesus was going to save them.

“Then,” continued BoBo. “I went home because Todd wanted me to, and discovered that I apparently had a goddamned daughter that was in  _ just  _ the right age range where everyone was sure I’d cheated on Jerb. We were at each other’s throats for  _ months,  _ then the girl tried to kill herself with pills that I’d been taking in a desperate attempt to lose weight because I  _ hate my body,  _ and I realised she was just my half-sister the whole time, and all of that was for  _ nothing.” _

There was a long, painful silence.

“Then I fell off a goddamn building, oh, and my  _ abusive mother died,  _ and I don’t know  _ how  _ I feel about that, and I  _ told  _ Jerb I’d let him know if I wasn’t okay, but then I didn’t because I’m a hypocritical asshole, and now I can’t ask him for support because I’d have to admit I was hiding how I felt.” 

He gave them a moment for his words to sink in.

“So yeah,” he said casually. “That’s been my last two years. How about yours?”

* * *

The other AA members are on the edges of their seats. “What happened?” asks one.

“Is BoBo okay?” asks another.

“Guys, guys,” says Sarah. “I’m getting there. But, since this is the most dramatic point in the story, you know what it’s time for?”

The room is silent.

“...The resolution?” says someone hopefully.

“Nope!” chimes Sarah cheerfully. “It’s time for a completely different story that is, at best, tangentially related to what I was telling you.”

Everyone groans.

“So,” explains Sarah. “BoBo had this old roommate, who moved out right before I OD’d, and recently I caught up with him and he told me this story. His name is … Emperor Finger-Face.” At their confused looks, she adds, “What? I don’t want to use real names, and this way’s more fun. Anyway, Emperor Finger-Face lives in the same apartment as BoBo’s ex-agent, whose name is … Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning in the Shape of a Woman.”

* * *

“Good morning, Emperor Finger-Face!”

“Good morning to you, Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning!”

Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning grabbed her handbag.

“See you tonight?” asked Emperor Finger-Face.

“Afternoon,” corrected Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning. “I wanna talk to you, so I set a meeting through your assistant.” She frowned. “Have you seen my keys?”

“Butter tray in the fridge,” answered Emperor Finger-Face. “I think I put them there during one of my night terrors.”

She groaned. “I don't have time to go to the kitchen. I'll just hotwire my car.”

He frowned. “Hey, did you eat breakfast?”

“No time for meals. I just grab whatever I can, whenever I can.”

“Hold on,” said Emperor Finger-Face. “I know you're a gal on the go, but even tangled fogs of pulsating yearning need to eat right.”

“I'll get something on set,” she said. 

“Pinky swear?”

She tried to do a pinkie swear with him, but this failed due to the lack of clarity as to how the fingers attached to his hand-face were different to the ones attached to his hands.

* * *

“I feel like you made the characters too weird,” says one audience member.

“Yeah,” agrees another. “It makes the story hard to follow.”

Sarah gives an irritated sigh. “All you need to know is that they live together and they’re friends, blah blah blah. Also, Emperor Finger-Face accidentally became a CEO or whatever at this company where Tangled For of Pulsating Yearning lives. Anyway, later that day was the meeting.”

* * *

“What can I do you for?”

“I have no workspace on set,” explained Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning in the Shape of a Woman. “I was hoping we could allocate some money to get me an office.” She shuffled some papers. “Oh, look, here's the exact paperwork you need all filled out and ready to go.”

“Okay,” said Emperor Finger-Face.

“Just needs your signature.”

“Let me retrieve my pen.”

“Marvelous!”

“Yep,” he said, as he reached into his jacket pocket. “I am currently gripping my pen inside my jacket. Now to just pull it out and sign this document.”

Tangled Fog of Pulsating Yearning chuckled. “Just goes to show, you get what you need if you pull the right strings.”

His eyes widened. “Strings?” He gasped dramatically. “It was you!” He stood up, pointing a finger at Tangled For of Pulsating Yearning accusingly.

“What was me?”

“The last string cheese in the apartment, I was saving it. And you took it! And now you want me to give you an office?!”

“What?!” she said defensively. “I didn’t take your cheese.”

* * *

“Did she take the cheese?”

“Actually,” explains Sarah. “I don’t really know yet, that conflict is still unfolding. But now that we’re at the most dramatic part of that story, let’s find out what happened to BoBo the Angsty Zebra!”

* * *

The two sat outside in painful silence.

BoBo’s outburst had, quite frankly, made everyone else at the party uncomfortable, and so Sarah had quickly dragged him outside for some “fresh air”. They sat on the sidewalk quietly, breathing in the evening air, looking up at the night sky. It brought back memories. Memories of the ceiling of a planetarium.

“...I’m sorry,” muttered BoBo finally. 

“What for?” asked Sarah.

“For making a huge scene and forcing you to babysit me when this is  _ your  _ party.” He hesitated. “For taking you to the planetarium. I should have gotten Herb to help you, he knows what to do when people are upset. For taking you on the bender in the first place.”

“You were trying to help at the planetarium,” said Sarah. “And honestly, I was only sober because I wanted to see what it feels like to try drugs again after being clean for a while. If you hadn’t gotten me to relapse, something else would have.”

“I gave you the heroin, though. I almost killed you. And,” He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry I wasn’t better to you when we were working on the show.”

He didn’t need to specify what he was talking about. “You didn’t know about my stepdad,” she muttered uneasily. 

“I  _ should  _ have known. Or at least not been such a dick to you. I’m so sorry for all of it, Sarah. You deserved so much better than what you got. I’m  _ so  _ glad you’re alive.”

“And I’m glad  _ you’re  _ alive.”

BoBo avoided eye contact. “I am too … sometimes. Other times I just want to yell at Jerb for being such an idiot and dragging me out of that pool.”

“I get it,” she said, placing a hand on his shoulder. “You feel like shit, and you’re taking  _ way  _ too much of that medication because you feel like it’s the only thing you’ve got.” She sighed. “BoBo, you need help.”

“That’s what Jerb said.”

“Jerb is right. He pulled you out of that pool because he  _ loves  _ you, and he hates seeing you hurting like this.”

BoBo remained silent.

“Come on, BoBo. Please.”

A speck of yellow in the distance caused BoBo to look up. “Shit, I think that’s Jerb.” He groaned. “What am I going to tell him?”

“The truth,” said Sarah. “That you had an outburst at the party because you were arguing with Brady. And,” she added hopefully. “That you’ve been taking too many pills and you’ve been  _ really  _ stressed lately, and you think maybe you should start seeing a therapist.”

“I don’t know,” muttered BoBo uneasily. 

The car drove toward them, coming to a stop in the driveway, and the passenger door opened. BoBo stood up and waved his goodbyes to Sarah before he got in.

Jerb sighed. “What happened?”

“...I had a fight with Brady,” explained BoBo. “He was demanding to know what happened while I was in Michigan, and I lost my shit and explained everything.”

“...Oh,” said Jerb as they began driving.

“I know, I know, I shouldn’t have told them, I --”

“No, BJ, that’s not what I’m upset about.”

* * *

“Wait,” asks one person. “Who’s BJ?”

“It’s Jerb’s nickname for BoBo,” explains Sarah.

“Why? What does it stand for?”

Sarah’s eyes widen. “...Shit.”

The tattoo-covered woman -- her name’s Sharona, Sarah thinks -- looks up. “Is this actually a story about BoJack Horseman and Herb Kazzaz?”

“No,” says Sarah. “...Okay, maybe. ...Yeah, it is.”

* * *

“No, BJ,” said Herb. “that’s not what I’m upset about.”

“It should be,” said BoJack. “I made a huge scene and guilt-tripped everyone. It was kind of a dick move.”

“Yeah, well, maybe you shouldn’t be choosing parties to finally talk about how you feel.” He sighed. “You said you’d tell me if you weren’t okay.”

“I’m sorry,” mumbled BoJack. “I … didn’t want to worry you.”

“Well, now I’m worried.” He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. “BJ. I don’t think you’re actually going to listen to this, but I’m saying it anyway.  _ You need help.” _

“No I don’t,” said BoJack automatically.

“You’re a severe alcoholic and you’re also getting addicted to the pain meds, you’ve attempted suicide at least once and told me that you want to try again at least three separate times, you have severe body image issues, and this  _ Philbert  _ show is  _ obviously  _ the only reason you’re getting out of bed.”

BoJack remained silent.

Herb sighed. “I know it can be scary. But I promise you, seeking help is worth it. Diane’s been seeing a therapist for years and it really helps her. You don’t have to feel like this, BJ.”

BoJack remained silent.

“So what do you say?” asked Herb. “Ready to get some professional help?”

BoJack took a deep breath.

“No.”


	18. Bad Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hollyhock has a break from college, and heads to L.A. on her way over to Kansas. BoJack runs out of painkillers due to his irresponsible usage and struggles against withdrawal symptoms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> disclaimer: this is probably the most medically inaccurate chapter of this fic. I cant say exactly how because spoilers but the authors note at the end explains exactly how much of this was probably wrong.

_ “I don’t know what’s real anymore. And I don’t know if I care.” _

“She was gonna get us all killed.”

“So you took care of it, huh?”

“I tried to stop him!”

“Who?”

“Fritz! He was hopped up on goof-berries.”

The pills rattle in his pocket.

His phone buzzes infinitely with a million messages from calls he never answered. 

“I had no choice, he was strangling my wife!”

“What did you do with the bodies?”

“I-It’s all a blur.”

_ It’s all a blur.  _

“It feels like a dream.”

The pills rattle.

“Where are the bodies, Philbert?”

“I buried them. In the same place I’m gonna bury you.”

Gina gasps.

“Right here.” He places a hand over his heart as it  _ pounds,  _ threatening to burst out of his chest with each passing moment.

“Kiss me, you smart, handsome renegade.”

“There’s no time for that now. The nuclear missiles are coming.”

The pills rattle. It’s all a blur.

“Seriously, what the hell are goof-berries?”

The pills rattle. Every day the sound gets louder. More space between pills, so they move around more. 

“Hey, I’m going home to Kansas for my break, and I was going to stop by L.A. on the way to see you guys, is that okay?”

The pills stop rattling.

_ “I don’t know what’s real anymore.” _

The empty bottle is silent.

_ “And I don’t know if I care.” _

* * *

She steps outside and sees them immediately. Herb is holding a sign proudly displaying the words  _ Manheim-Mannheim-Guerrero-Robinson  _ in large letters that take up the whole sign, while BoJack is next to him, wearing a detective outfit for some reason, with a sign that says in somewhat shaky and faded handwriting,  _ Zilberschlag-Hsung-Fonzarelli-McQuack. _

She chuckles. “I love the signs.”

“You better,” says BoJack. “We basically had to go through a whole pen on them.”

Herb passes his sign over to BoJack and takes Hollyhock’s bag. They walk over to the car and Hollyhock climbs into the back seat while Herb gets into the driver’s seat, with BoJack taking a seat beside him. “It’s cool that you came through Los Angeles on your way home.”

“Yeah,” says Hollyhock. “I guess we got lucky. The only flight from Connecticut to Kansas had a one-night layover in California.”

Herb misses the sarcasm. “Really?”

“No, dummy.” She smiles. “I wanted to see you two again.” 

There’s a long, painful silence.

She sighs. “Look, I know things didn’t go so well the last time I visited, but you were both going through a hard time then, and I wanted to give you another chance.”

“That’s really generous of you,” says Herb.

“Yeah,” agrees BoJack. “But we’re doing much better now. We won’t let you down.” He looks anxious for a second, but quickly regains his composure. “Hey Herb, can we go to a drive-thru or something on the way home? I’m so hungry I could eat a horse.”

Hollyhock blinks. “That’s a really weird thing to say.”

“Uh…” BoJack forces a nervous chuckle, then shoves his arm into his mouth. He pretends to bite on it a bit, then removes it. “Look at me, I’m Herb and I get kicked out of gay bars for eating myself!”

“That happened  _ one  _ time!” protests Herb.

“How many times is it meant to happen?” asks Hollyhock.

Herb clears his throat. “We can go to the drive-thru any time. We haven’t seen Hollyhock in months, shouldn’t we go to an actual restaurant?”

“Good idea,” says Hollyhock. “What’s a good place in the area?”

BoJack’s eyes light up. “I know a great place,  _ and  _ we can get a great discount there.”

“Oh, do you know someone who works there?”

“No, I own the restaurant.”

Hollyhock blinks.

“He impulse-brought it to impress me when he was drunk,” explains Herb.

“...Well, let’s go there, then.” She chuckles. “I bet BoJack’s a great restaurant owner.”

* * *

BoJack, to the surprise of absolutely nobody except possibly himself and Hollyhock, is a terrible restaurant owner.

He walks into Elefante and is immediately swarmed by overworked employees begging him for help.

“Please,” says one waitress. “Half of your employees aren’t even qualified to do  _ anything  _ related to running the restaurant, I don’t even know why you hired them!”

“We’ve been having to exclusively pre-made food because all of the cooks quit in 2016!”

“Yesterday we found a turkey that had gotten stuck in the freezer for several hours, and he didn’t get out until we heard him screaming because he broke his arm!”

BoJack groans emphatically. “This place practically runs itself. I’m just here to have a nice meal with my husband and sister, thank you very much.”

He takes a seat at a table, and Herb and Hollyhock sit down with him. Hollyhock frowns. “Shouldn’t you help them run this place?”

“Eh, they do pretty well themselves.”

“They found a turkey in the freezer.”

“I think that’s just part of restaurant life.”

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow. “Uh, I had a part-time job at KFC when I was fourteen, and we  _ never  _ found a turkey in the freezer.”

“Details, details.” A pug waitress hands them their menus, and BoJack starts reading through his. “So Hollyhock, how’s college been?”

“Honestly, it’s been kinda sucky.” She sighs. “Now that I’m in a dorm, I have to do all this  _ adulting  _ stuff. It’s, like, a whole thing. And I have to do class work on top of that! And rugby, of course.”

“You do rugby?” asks Herb.

“Yeah, for my college team.”

“I always preferred basketball, myself.”

“Rugby’s way better.” She glances over at BoJack. “Why are you dressed like a detective?”

“It’s for a show I’m doing. We just finished filming but I still haven’t returned the outfit.”

“Oh yeah, you’re in  _ Philbert,  _ aren’t you? My friend Tawnie says she’s gonna watch it when it comes out.”

“I wouldn’t recommend it, it’s completely insane. Also, there’s a nude scene of me.”

Hollyhock cringes. “I do  _ not  _ want to see that.”

“Didn’t exactly expect you to,” snarks BoJack. “Most people don’t want to see their fifty-year-old brother’s dick.”

“Can we  _ please  _ talk about something else?”

Herb clears his throat. “What do you guys want?”

“I’m kinda craving pizza,” says Hollyhock.

BoJack chuckles nervously. “Eh, I’m not really hungry.”

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow. “But you’re the one who suggested we eat.”

_ “Whaaaaat?”  _ asked BoJack in overexaggerated confusion. “Pfft, no, I -- I didn’t --”

“Yeah you did,” says Hollyhock. “You even said you were so hungry you could eat a horse. Then I said that was a weird thing to say, and you did a really bad impression of Herb getting kicked out of a gay bar for eating himself.”

“That happened  _ one  _ time!” protests Herb.

“Exactly,” says Hollyhock. “Herb said that, and I asked how many times it’s supposed to happen, and then Herb changed the subject. So you _ definitely  _ suggested eating.”

BoJack waves a trembling hand dismissively. “You guys order without me. I’ll be back in a minute, I just need some fresh air.” He stands up on shaking legs and exits the room.

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow and turns to Herb. “Is it just me, or is he acting kinda weird?”

“...No, I think it’s just you,” says Herb.

* * *

He leans against the outer wall of the restaurant, staring down at his shaking hands. His heart is beating  _ fast,  _ too fast, so fast he can’t  _ breathe,  _ and it’s deafening, a never-ending pounding in his ears. He stands there, relying on the wall to support his weight because God knows his trembling legs can’t, and gasps for air.

He manages to take out his phone, though he comes dangerously close to dropping it onto the pavement. He fails to enter the passcode several times before he can finally unlock it, and it’s something of a small miracle that he manages to reach his contacts list and make the call.

“BoJack?” asks Diane.

“Sorry,” he says automatically. “I need someone to talk to, and you’re the only person I knew would be available on a Friday night.”

“Okay,” says Diane. “First of all, rude. Second of all, I was going to go see a movie, but there was nothing in the eight o’clock hour. And third, I’m actually busy right now.”

“Wait, seriously?”

“Yeah, Todd needs my help with something. I’ll call you back, okay?”

BoJack gulps. “Okay.”

He hangs up, and the line goes dead. His life line goes dead. He pats his pocket, hoping for the familiar rattle of pills, and hears nothing. It takes every ounce of his self-control to resist the urge to slide against the wall and curl up on the floor like a goddamned baby.

“Shit,” he mutters.

He takes several deep breaths. “Okay, BoJack. You’ve got this. Just keep it together for one night.” 

He straightens up, and goes back inside.

* * *

Hollyhock stares at him as he comes back inside. “You okay?”

“Y-Yeah,” pants BoJack, wiping a layer of sweat from his forehead.

“You sure? You seem --”

Herb launches into a mysterious coughing fit that distracts them from any question of BoJack’s wellbeing. “So,” he says loudly. “Some weather we’re having, huh?”

“What are you talking about? The weather’s fine.” She sighs irritably, nudging a slice of pizza with her fork. “Ugh, whatever. What’s new in your lives?”

“Things have been going pretty well, actually,” says Herb. “A close friend of ours recently woke up from a coma, which is nice. BJ just finished up filming  _ Philbert,  _ oh, and one of our friends is trying to adopt a kid.”

Hollyhock’s eyes light up. “Really?”

“Yeah,” explains Herb, glad that he’s managed to catch her attention. “She hasn’t been having much luck, but I’m sure she’ll get there eventually.”

“Cool,” says Hollyhock. “Does she have a partner, or … ?”

“Not that I know of. She … kind of had a crush on BJ that she never got over.”

“Seriously?”

“Well, she dated a few people, but yeah, I don’t think she ever  _ really  _ got over BJ. That’s the only reason I can see why she would break up with that one guy that was really nice to her. I want to say his name was Victor?”

BoJack groans. “His name was Vincent Adultman and he was three kids in a trenchcoat,” he practically snarls.

Hollyhock flinches. “What are you so angry about?”

“Nobody except me understands that Vincent Adultman was three kids in a trenchcoat!”

“I know, but you seem  _ really  _ angry. Calm down.”

BoJack sighs. “Sorry.”

“Besides,” says Herb. “he obviously wasn’t a child. Would the business factory be able to get away with child labour?”

“Business factory?” asks Hollyhock.

“Yeah, the business factory. It was where Vincent Adultman worked.”

“That does  _ not  _ sound like a real workplace.”

“Says the girl that worked at KFC.”

“I was fourteen! Where else was I meant to work?”

Herb’s attempt at a response is interrupted by a loud annoying cover of the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ theme. BoJack flinches badly. “Shit, is that your phone or mine?”

Herb checks his phone. “It’s yours.”

“God dammit. I’ll go out and take it.”

He stumbles to his feet and limps out. Hollyhock frowns. “Are you  _ sure  _ he’s okay?”

“Yeah, he’s absolutely fine. Trust me.”

* * *

It’s amazing how fast things can change -- just a few weeks ago, seeing an incoming call from the number was a literal miracle, but now, it fills him with dread. But he’s already gone outside to take it, and she’ll just keep trying to get in touch if he ignores it, so he leans against the outer wall and presses the answer button.

“BoJack!” yells Sarah emphatically.

He winces. “Keep it down, okay?”

“Sorry. Just wanted to check on you? You seemed like you were going through a hard time at the party, so I was hoping maybe you were doing better now.”

BoJack moans. “I feel like  _ shit.” _

“What’s wrong?”

“Withdrawals.”

“So you’re trying to kick the painkillers?” There’s a hopeful edge to her voice. BoJack would be tempted to lie for her sake, perhaps, if she were two decades younger and he had any energy left over from having to keep his shit together in front of Hollyhock.

“No,” he says bluntly. “I was taking them way faster than I was meant to, and now I’ve run out.  _ Please  _ tell me you know where I can get more.”

“I told you, I threw all my drugs out.”

“What about dealers?”

“The main one was Dr. Hu and he had an epiphany after I OD’d. Besides,” she says gently. “Maybe this is for the best.”

_ “How  _ is this for the best?!”

“Now that you don’t have any more pills, we know you can’t accidentally overdose on them. With how many you were having at the party, it’s a miracle you haven’t ended up in hospital, especially since you were mixing them with alcohol.”

“Didn’t you mix basically everything under the sun?”

“Yeah, and I ended up in a two-year coma.” She sighs. “Look, BoJack, trust me when I say that this is best in the long run. If you kept up that drug habit, you would have  _ died.”  _

“Sounds nice.” He groans. “Look, I’ve gotta go, my sister’s visiting and I have to go back inside and pretend I’m fine. Wish me luck.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks, I’ll need it.” He hangs up with shaking hands and staggers back inside.

* * *

He practically falls into his chair, and he can feel Hollyhock staring at him, but there’s nothing he can do at this point. “Sorry,” he says through gritted teeth. “I had to take that, it was the friend that just got out of a coma. What did I miss?”

“We were just talking about how you’re  _ completely  _ unfit to maintain a restaurant,” says Hollyhock with a laugh.

“I told you, this place practically runs itself!”

“BJ,” says Herb. “They  _ literally  _ found a turkey that had been stuck in the freezer for hours and didn’t get out until he broke his arm.”

“Poor thing,” says Hollyhock. “It must have been really cold.”

“Pfft, you think that’s bad?” scoffs BoJack. “The last time I came here, I accidentally fired a cook, who then got all the other cooks to quit, so I promoted a waiter to cook and promoted a random customer to waitress. Then the cook slash waiter ran around the restaurant on fire for a bit. Also, Princess Carolyn almost killed me.”

“Are you  _ sure  _ this place practically runs itself?” asks Hollyhock.

“Trust me, it’s fine.” He winces. “So how’s that kid you mentioned in your phone call? The one you’re in love with?”

Hollyhock forces a laugh. “I do  _ not  _ like Joby. His jawline is, like, dumb.”

The  _ Horsin’ Around  _ ringtone fills the room, and BoJack groans.  _ “Please  _ tell me that’s your phone.”

“Why don’t you just check?” asks Hollyhock.

Herb ignores her, checking his phone. “Sorry, it’s yours.”

“God dammit.” He takes his phone out. It’s Diane. “Ugh, who cares.” He carelessly declines the call, ignoring the nagging voice in his head telling him that he should at least text her to let her know he’s okay, and glances at the time. “Hey Hollyhock, what time do we have to get you back to the airport?”

Hollyhock’s face falls.

“I mean,” she mutters meekly. “I can go now, if you want.”

“No,” says Herb hurriedly. “We didn’t mean --”

“Didn’t you?” asks Hollyhock. “I mean, you’ve both been acting  _ super  _ weird all night, and you keep finding excuses to leave, and --” She sniffles. “Am  _ I  _ the problem?”

“What? God, no.” Guilt washes over BoJack as tears start to fall from Hollyhock’s eyes, and reaching out to place a hand on her shoulder causes his breath to hitch in pain but he does it anyway. “Hollyhock, I promise you’re not the problem, and I’m sorry for making you feel that way. I just …  _ shit…” _

He withdraws his hand and grunts, tightly shutting his eyes in pain. In an instant Herb is out of his seat and gently wrapping his arms around his husband. “BJ, breathe.”

Hollyhock stares at them with wide eyes. “Oh my God, are you okay?!”

“...Yeah,” BoJack says through gritted teeth after a long pause. “Yeah, I’m good.”

Somehow, this doesn’t convince her.

“What’s wrong?” she asks anxiously.

BoJack hesitates. “Withdrawal.”

Her eyes widen and she stutters out some objection based on a very black-and-white view of drugs, but he cuts her off. “No, not like that,” he says, and it’s not  _ entirely  _ true, but she doesn’t need to be burdened with the responsibility of somehow healing his substance abuse issues. “I got hurt on set a while back and they prescribed me painkillers for it, that’s all. Except I ran out and now I feel like shit.”

Hollyhock frowns. “Can’t you get more?”

“They’re  _ highly  _ addictive, so I probably won’t get prescribed them again.”

“Well, maybe that’s for the best. We wouldn’t want you to get addicted.”

Luckily, when BoJack winces in response to this, Hollyhock assumes it’s a reaction to the pain. “On one hand, you’re completely right, but on the other hand, you would  _ not  _ be saying that if you were the one going through withdrawal.” He groans. “Can we go home?”

“I can hang out with you guys at home,” says Hollyhock. “I have been meaning to test out your pool. Besides, I ate too much pizza and I need ice cream to smoosh it down, and the restaurant doesn’t sell any.”

“You’re in luck,” says Herb. “BoJack was  _ going  _ to eat all the ice cream last night, but I made him save some in case you wanted some.”

Hollyhock laughs. “What would you two do without each other?”

“I don’t know,” says BoJack through gritted teeth. “But I feel like I’d be in some sort of bizarre situation where I’m on the run from the cops.” He winces. “Come on, let’s go home.”

* * *

When you write someone’s biography, you learn certain things about them. Like how they always feel the need to sign off their voicemails with “This is BoJack, by the way. Horseman, obviously,” even though cell phones tell you who the voicemail is from if it’s someone in your contacts, and how they’re absolutely  _ repulsed  _ by the mere mention of honeydew, and how if they ask you to call them back and then don’t answer when you do, it’s a  _ bad sign. _

Diane paces around her tiny excuse for an apartment, waiting for him to respond to the text message, the one she sent after he ignored her call. She’s on the verge of calling Herb to figure out what’s going on when her phone buzzes.

**Diane: Are you okay? You didn’t answer my call and I was worried.**

**BoJack: oh yeah sorry**

**BoJack: i feel loke hell**

**Diane: What’s going on?**

**BoJack: ran out od painkillers**

**BoJack: withdrawals are a bitcj**

**Diane: Weren’t those supposed to last three months?**

**Diane: BoJack how many of those were you taking?**

**BoJack: yeh i kinda made my own bed on yhat one**

**Diane: No wonder you’re in withdrawal.**

**BoJack: not helpig**

**Diane: Please tell me you’re not going to try some sort of bizarre sitcom scheme to get more drugs.**

**BoJack: i mean i would vut i can barely get out of bef**

**BoJack: besides sarahs clean now**

**Diane: Wrong answer. If you were taking enough of them to run out this early, you have a problem and you shouldn’t even think about trying to get more. Unless you get hurt again of course but that’s not very likely.**

**Diane: Promise me you won’t try to get more drugs unless you get hurt again and a doctor prescribes them.**

**BoJack: i promise**

* * *

She sits up in her seat, anxiously peering through the window. “Are we nearly there?”

“Relax,” says Herb. “We’re not going to miss your flight.”

“I hope not,” mumbles Hollyhock, checking the time on her phone.

“We’re five minutes away,” says BoJack. 

It’s actually significantly longer than five minutes when they pull up in front of the airport, but there’s still no danger of her missing her flight, so she opens the door without complaint. She steps outside the car and turns to speak to Herb and BoJack through the open window. “Thanks for having me.”

“Thanks for coming,” says Herb. “I know it wasn’t really the best visit…”

“I mean, out of my two visits, it was.” She chuckles. “I know I came at a bad time, but that’s not your fault. I’ll try to visit again on my way back to college, okay?”

“Good idea,” says BoJack. “And, uh, I’ll keep calling you on Sundays.”

“Okay. Love you, bye.”

BoJack’s heart skips a beat. “Love you too, Hollyhock.”

* * *

BoJack doesn’t sleep that night.

This is about as surprising as the empty pill bottle that he occasionally shakes on instinct -- not at all surprising, but still just as unpleasant. He tosses and turns and groans and hopes to God that he’s not keeping Herb awake. Finally he climbs out of bed, leaning against a wall, and begins to stagger out of the room.

“... Whah?” asks Herb sleepily.

“Just getting some air,” says BoJack through gritted teeth.

Herb turns over and goes back to sleep.

He’s not sure how long it is before he wakes up again -- it could be a few minutes, or it could be an hour. He’s only vaguely aware of the fact that there’s some annoyingly loud noise, and that this is bad because he’s trying to sleep, God dammit, and wait, holy shit, someone’s screaming.

His eyes shoot open.

He practically jumps out of bed and follows the noise until it leads him outside, to the pool. In the low light of the evening, he can see the source of the ear-splitting scream -- BoJack Horseman, lying on the ground next to the pool, writhing in agony. In an instant he’s at the scene, crouching over BoJack and helping him up. “Holy shit, what happened?”

“I-I slipped,” he manages to say through his frantic breaths. “Herb it  _ hurts,  _ Herb please make it stop, I-I-I--”

“Woah, BJ, breathe. God, you’re shaking. Come on, sit up.”

With Herb’s help, he manages to get into a sitting position and slow down his frantic breaths. He cradles his right arm in his left, teeth gritted in pain. “I-I landed on my a-arm and it  _ hurts,  _ Herb, I think it’s broken,  _ please,  _ I-I--”

Herb sighs. 

“BJ, are you  _ actually  _ hurt, or are you just in withdrawal?”

“Would I lie about this?!” demands BoJack, his voice seeming to rise an octave with pain and agitation.

“...I mean,  _ probably… _ ”

“I’m  _ not  _ lying!”

Herb hesitates, then sighs. “Let me see.” BoJack flinches away at first, but then hesitantly relaxes, and manages to keep his pained noises to a minimum as Herb carefully rolls up his sleeve. Herb can’t help but cringe. The wrist seems to curve unnaturally upward and the arm is already starting to swell. “Shit, sorry for not believing you. Hold still.” He peels off his shirt and uses it to tie a makeshift sling. “Come on, I’ll drive you to hospital.”

He pulls BoJack to his feet and holds his uninjured hand as they go out to the car. If BoJack feels a twinge of guilt at the way he deliberately let himself fall, he certainly doesn’t let it show.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> like I said, this is probably super medically inaccurate, because I've never taken drugs stronger than ibuprofen and its surprisingly difficult to find information on opiate withdrawal (seriously, it took ages to actually find something that lists the symptoms, rather than just a vague "opiate withdrawal is hell"). its probably not realistic for him to be functional and moving and shit but that's a necessary evil for the plot.
> 
> also, I know that you can break your arm just by falling badly, because that's what happened to me in year 6, but idk if it can break that badly? my broken arm in year 6 was pretty mild, to the point where I didn't even realise it was broken because I didn't think it hurt that much (and I was like 11 so I didn't exactly have a great pain tolerance). I thought that logically it being worse than that could be possible because when my dad was telling me off for being careless he said that I could have ended up with the bone going through the skin, but after writing the scene I realised that wait, hang on, my dad doesn't know shit about medics. but if it wasn't visibly broken then it would have taken herb longer to realise BJ wasn't lying, so again, necessary evil.
> 
> (also, for anyone who cares: the gag of Elefante being so poorly managed that they found a turkey in the freezer was meant to be a pun on the expression "going cold turkey")


	19. The Gutpuncher

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack spirals further into addiction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woohoo! this is officially the chapter that put this fic over 50k words! that is the longest of my fics by far and also the first time ive ever written a novel-length fic. yay!

The pills rattle.

“Fritz? But you’re dead!”

“Dead serious … about haunting you.”

The pills rattle. The sound multiplies a thousand times over, filling every room he enters. 

“I’ll try to visit again on my way back to college, okay?”

The pills rattle. His heart pounds like it’s going to burst out of his chest. He gasps for air.

“Too bad we’re not getting a second season.”

“I bet it’s the horse’s fault, he’s been super out of it the last couple episodes. Also, he thinks  _ Digimon  _ is better than  _ Pokemon.” _

The pills rattle.

“What does  _ Digimon  _ have to do with  _ Philbert?” _

“I don’t know, I just think he must be a real idiot to like  _ Digimon  _ more than  _ Pokemon.” _

The room spins.

“The Armenian genocide was too much, man!”

**“I don’t give a** **_damn_ ** **about Sabrina!”**

Everything darkens again, and he finds himself in that basement, looking up at a seemingly never-ending staircase.

“Jesus, BJ, how many of these things are you taking?”

“I’m serious, Herb” he pants. “I need those pills.”

The pills rattle. The wall cracks.

_ “What the hell is wrong with you?!” _

* * *

“You will not  _ believe  _ what I found at the thrift store.”

BoJack blinks several times in an attempt to decipher this statement. “What?” he finally says.

Herb holds up a  _ Horsin’ Around  _ DVD, and BoJack grabs it, struggling to read the text. “Holy shit, I didn’t even know you could still get this one. Didn’t they remove it from all the reruns?”

“Yeah, but I guess there’s still an old DVD somewhere. We’ve  _ got  _ to watch it.”

Sitcoms, in the eyes of anyone with enough time on their hands to actually analyse the progression of the quality of sitcoms, generally peak in quality around the second or third season. After that, usually due to a change in writing staff, the show is inevitably declared to have “jumped the shark” regardless of the actual quality; before that, the show is still finding its legs and figuring out the general tone of its comedy. BoJack and Herb, of course, are adamant that every season of  _ Horsin’ Around  _ is unwavering in its quality, but the fans agree that the first season is by far the worst. One of the many reasons for that is episode five,  _ Mr. Libertore. _

The episode, featuring the first and luckily the last on-screen appearance of Mr. Libertore, was described by fans, critics, and most of the staff as “a blatant excuse for a comedian who’s  _ clearly  _ more suited for writing to get a chance on-screen”, and by Herb Kazzaz as “a  _ great  _ episode, what are you guys talking about?”

The episode was removed from circulation following the controversy surrounding Herb being outed as gay, and everyone privately rejoiced when he wasn’t in the room.

“...Yeah,” says BoJack. “Let’s watch it.”

There are some things that never quite seem to get better or easier, no matter how many times you do them. Watching  _ Mr. Libertore  _ is one of those things, particularly when you have to suppress your desire to cringe and pretend it’s the best episode of all time.

The pills rattle, and BoJack watches the episode.

* * *

The pills rattle infinitely in his ears. The sound echoes on forever, filling the room even when he can’t hear them, even when all the pills are safely stored away at the back of cupboards and in packets of junk food that only BoJack eats and behind paintings that he knows won’t be touched specifically because they’ve been meaning to move them for the better part of a year now.

His fingers shake from cold (and maybe something else) as he retrieves a bottle from an empty ice cream container in the freezer and swallows down a handful of pills. 

It’s all a blur. It feels like a dream. He buried them, didn’t he? No, that was Philbert. The smart, handsome renegade.

What the hell are goof-berries?

Why does the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ house have two stairs? 

His phone seems to ring infinitely; the sound starts in his pocket and moves outward, circling him, bouncing and echoing and never seeming to stop. None of the people calling him have anything of value to say. It’s all stupid bullshit like “can you please help us run the restaurant that you own?” and “college has been nice, has your withdrawal stopped yet?” and “sir please we are begging you to help run this restaurant” and “why did you buy a restaurant if you won’t help us run it?” and “we found another turkey in the freezer please help us”.

**“He wants you to work** **_all day?_ ** **That’s too much, man!”**

There’s no air in his lungs as the room spins around him. 

**“I don’t give a** **_damn_ ** **about Sabrina, we need you to come in tomorrow! Come on. We’re understaffed. We** **_need_ ** **you.”**

Mr. Libertore reaches out to touch his shoulder.

“Hey, BJ? You okay?”

He blinks. “What?”

“You were kind of hyperventilating. And you’re shaking. Is something wrong?”

BoJack stares at him in silence for several excruciating seconds.

_ You’re losing it. Gotta be cool for Herb. What’s something a cool person would say? _

He stands up. “Uh, hey, Daddy-O. Gotta splitsville to the lavatory if you catch my drift! Hang ten.”

He runs to the bathroom, leaving a bewildered Herb behind, and grabs several pills from his stash in the back of the cupboard. He swallows them down with ease and blinks several times.

He finds himself once again in that large basement, looking at that never-ending staircase that leads up to a ball of light.

* * *

Herb gnaws at his fingernails as he paces. “Are you  _ sure  _ you didn’t accidentally tell him something?”   
“Trust me,” says Sarah through the phone. “The only name I mentioned was Dr. Hu, and he’s sobered up since I OD’d. Have you actually seen him taking anything?”

“No, but he’s been acting  _ really  _ weird. I’m  _ sure  _ he’s using again, but I don’t know where he could have gotten drugs. He broke his arm a while back and got prescribed the same painkillers again but I kept track of how many he was taking and we ran out a while ago.”

“He must have found a dealer somehow.” She pauses. “How’d he break his arm?”

“That was … kinda weird, actually, now that I think about it.” He rubs the back of his neck nervously. “We’d just run out of the ones he was meant to use for his back and he was in withdrawal. It was evening, I think, but we went to bed really early because we’d basically stayed up all night hanging out with his sister.”

“And?” asks Sarah.

“He couldn’t sleep, because, y’know, withdrawal, so he went out to get some fresh air. Apparently he managed to slip on the water next to the pool and land on his arm?” He frowns. “It seemed pretty dodgy at the time, but it was clearly broken, so I just believed him.”

“Hmm.” Sarah assumes a low and conspiratorial tone. “Maybe he did it on purpose? He asked me if I could recommend a dealer to him. I dunno, maybe he broke his arm so he’d be able to have painkillers until he could find someone who’d give them to him illegally?”

Herb gulps. “God, this whole thing is making me feel sick. Can you talk to him?”

“I mean, I’ll try. I don’t think he’ll listen, though. He needs professional help.”

“I know, but he won’t admit there’s a problem. It’s not like I can just pin him down and drag him to rehab.”

“Well, you probably could if you had some help. He has other friends, doesn’t he? Big, strong guys?”

Herb shudders. “Mr. Peanutbutter could probably help, I guess, but that’s an  _ absolute  _ last resort.”

“I’ll call him later on, okay?”

“Okay.” He sighs. “God, I hope you can talk sense into him.”

* * *

His shaking hands struggle to pause the episode of  _ Horsin’ Around  _ and answer the call, the ringing that never seems to stop, even when it does stop, always remaining in the back of his mind. “What?”

“Hey BoJack, is everything okay?” asks Sarah. “Herb said he thought you were using again.”

BoJack blinks. 

“I have to go,” he says automatically before rushing out of the room.

A second later, he stares at a pinboard covered in post-it notes with reminders and unconnected photos strung together with red string. He stares at it frowning.  _ “How  _ can he know that I’m on opiates again?”

The answer stares him in the face, and he ignores it.

He uses a thumb tack to stick a picture of Sarah’s face to the wall, next to one of Herb’s. “Herb knows something,” he mutters. “But, all my stashes are secure. Someone must have told him.”

He runs through the list of suspects.

* * *

“Diane! Diane! Diane!”

The knocking sound echoes a thousand times over in his ears before she finally opens the door. He points a finger accusingly at her in the doorway. “I know you told Herb!”

“Told Herb what?”

“That I’m using painkillers again.” Ignoring her concerned look, he continues: “See, great actors embody their rules, so I’ve picked up some detective skills. You’re a  _ nerd,  _ and nerds like math! And I have to do math to figure out how many drugs I can afford, so you must know.”

“What?” chokes Diane. “That makes  _ no  _ sense. How high are you?”

He ignores this. “You  _ love  _ revealing my secrets! And not sharing your cobbler.”

Diane sighs, and hands her dinner over to him. “God, you’re a mess. Just stay here for a while, okay? Get some rest.”

* * *

He paces around that empty basement, ignoring that never-ending spiral staircase leading into a ball of light. “This whole thing is rotten,” he says to nobody in particular. 

“He’s been so …  _ distracted  _ for the last few episodes. I hope he’s okay.”

“I’m just pissed that he’s ruined my big chance. This could have been a great, popular show if he wasn’t too hopped up on goof-berries to be a decent actor. Also, he likes  _ Digimon  _ more than  _ Pokemon,  _ so he basically has no rights.”

**“Yowza-yowza-bo-bowza! I’ve invented a memory-erasing device!”**

“Unless…” he murmurs, blinking rapidly. “Unless Herb didn’t tell her anything.” He gasps. “That’s it! She’s sober now, she’s partying, she keeps checking up on me -- it’s all a trap! It’s all --”

“It’s a trap. And it’s working.” 

He turns in shock, and watches as a young girl looks up at him with childish innocence and wide sea-green eyes. Her overalls are bright pink and her hair is parted evenly. “S-Sabrina, I --” He struggles to explain himself. “I swear,  _ Philbert  _ was going fine! I was a little out of it, but that’s not why it got cancelled! I --”

She blinks.

There’s music playing in the background. Something that sounds like it comes from a shitty sitcom -- nothing like the  _ Horsin’ Around  _ theme, but similar to the theme tunes of other shows from that era. He can only back away in terror as Sabrina starts to sing.

_ “Life is a never-ending show, my friend _

_ A twisting, turning, ever-bending show _

_ The audience is everyone you know, my friend, _

_ Leave them with a smile when you go!” _

He watches in awe as a circle of the ground she’s standing on seems to be cut away from the rest of the floor by some invisible knife, and transforms into a rising platform. She continues singing as she rises.

_ “You can bet that you’re a star _

_ So don’t forget how fun you are! _

_ Get out there and give it your all! _

_ And don’t stop dancin’, _

_ Don’t stop dancin’ ‘till the curtain call!” _

In an instant she seems to grow a good twenty years, and the platform turns into a pole that she slides down. The music becomes more modern, more synthesized, with too much autotune and a chord progression ripped straight out of  _ Prickly Muffin.  _ The Sarah Lynn that dances sensually in front of him is the same one from that night in the planetarium, and the sky is full of stars.

_ “Shows are a never-ending life, of course, _

_ A legacy that haunts you all your life _

_ Screw it up and everyone will know, old horse!  _

_ Stay calm through all the struggle and the strife…” _

BoJack takes several steps backward.

_ “You run the race, you blurt your lines, _

_ Pretend that everything is fine _

_ That’s what you taught me when I was small… _

_ And don’t stop dancin’, no, you can’t stop dancin’ till the curtains fall!” _

The song has a short instrumental break, and the over synthesized strings of Sarah Lynn’s work fall out in favour of more peaceful, authentic violins. Sarah runs a hand through the side of her hair, and it falls away as she does, creating a perfect undercut. She gives him a genuine smile.

_ “Today’s the day, you’ve got the spark, _

_ You’ll find a way to make your mark _

_ And put your tiny name on that wall! _

_ So don’t stop dancin’, baby, don’t stop spinnin’! _

_ Don’t stop beltin’, buddy, now we’re winnin’! _

_ Pain consumes you but you just keep grinnin’! _

_ The ache becomes you and it’s just beginnin’!  _

_ So don’t stop dancin’! _

_ Nothing’s certain but the curtain…” _

He shoots up in bed, gasping for air. 

Herb gives him a look. “You okay, BJ?”

“Yeah,” he pants. “I’m good.”

The pills rattle.

* * *

The empty ice cream container is truly empty; the paintings that he’s been meaning to move for months are hiding nothing; there’s no pills hidden in the back of cupboards. It’s all right here, in front of him, piled on the table.

“I found your hiding places,” says Herb. “I’ve known you were high for a while, but I couldn’t tell where the pills were. But, the game’s up.”

BoJack’s heart skips a beat.

“Jesus, BJ, how many of these things are you taking in a day?”

“Hey,” says BoJack automatically. “Those are mine, okay?” He makes a lunge for the pile, but Herb grabs his shoulders and pulls them back. “I need those!”

**“I don’t give a** **_damn_ ** **about Sabrina!” Mr. Libertore yells. “We need you to come in tomorrow. Come on. We’re understaffed. We need you.”**

**“You don’t understand,” insists the horse. “She’s been practicing for her school play for weeks! It would break her heart if I missed it.”**

**“Can’t you just watch a video? We really need you.”**

**“I’m serious,** Herb,” he pants. “I need those pills!”

“Bullshit.”

“You have no idea what I’m going through!”

“I know  _ everything  _ you’re going through! I’m your  _ husband!”  _ He groans. “I have been your life jacket through  _ everything,  _ but you seem  _ determined  _ to drown!”

**“I’m serious,” insists the horse. “This might be too much.”**

**“That’s too much, man!” agrees Sabrina.**

**“What other choice do we have?” asks Ethan.**

“You’re  _ choosing  _ this!” yells Herb, frustration at an absolute boiling point. “You’re  _ choosing  _ to self-sabotage and make everyone worried about you so you can get high!”

“No,” insists BoJack. “It’s not high, Herb, that’s not -- It makes things normal.”

“Normal?! You’re a goddamn mess and everyone can see it! Jesus Christ, you need help!”

“Give me my pills back!”

“No!”

**“I’ve heard of getting all** **_fired_ ** **up to avoid consequences of your actions, but this is ridiculous.”**

**“It’s the only way for you to not get fired,” insists Ethan. “Besides, memory erasing devices are like chloroform -- once you have it, you can’t** **_not_ ** **use it.”**

**“Erasing my boss’s memory is** **_illegal,_ ** **though. If anyone finds out what I did…”**

“Herb, I’m not kidding. The pills, now!”

He shoves his arm into a wall and it cracks. Herb flinches. “You’re out of control!”

“Give them to me!” he practically snarls.

* * *

He blinks.

“Where am I?”

He manages to recognize the inside of Diane’s pathetically tiny excuse for an apartment.

“...Shit, what happened?”

**“You got into a fight with your boss over my school play?”**

_ “What the hell is wrong with you?!” _

**“...That’s too much, man.”**


	20. The Punched Gut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Following a particularly bad fight caused by BoJack's drug problem, Herb and BoJack both realise that they need to make some serious changes in their relationship if they don't want to both end up in a self-destructive spiral - and it starts with BoJack kicking his addictions.

“...Shit, what happened?”

There’s a long, painful silence.

He manages to prop himself up on his shoulders and get into a sitting position as he realises he’s been lying on Diane’s couch. His head is pounding, like it always does when he’s hungover, which seems to be his default state when he’s not drunk. These are the clues, and the mystery is how he ended up here.

Maybe he just got into some bizarre sitcom hijinks. He thinks he can remember a glimpse of Todd in his house. Yeah, that’s it, maybe. Some sort of whacky scheme that he got roped into while drunk, and he’s at Diane’s house because … he came over to visit and ended up passing out?

Yet that fails to explain the one clear memory he has of the previous night; a bruised, tear-stained face looking up at him.

_ “What the hell is wrong with you?!” _

Pfft, stupid question. What the hell _ isn’t? _

He groans aloud, and the noise must bring some attention to his existence, because he hears footsteps. He expects it to be Diane sticking her head in the doorway, but it’s instead Mr. Peanutbutter, with an anxious look on his face. He glances at him, and then turns back out of sight as though he isn’t there. “He’s awake,” he whispers to some unseen companions.

“Oh, fish,” says Princess Carolyn’s voice.

“This is a good thing, isn’t it?” asks Mr. Peanutbutter. “Since now we can … tell him?”

“That’s the problem,” says a third voice -- Diane. “We don’t know how he’ll react. We don’t even know how much he remembers.”

“Can’t we just ask him?” asks Princess Carolyn.

“We probably should, now that he’s awake. He can probably hear us.” She groans. “I  _ told  _ him he should have just called the cops, but  _ no,  _ we have to ‘give him a chance’.”

BoJack gulps.

“Come on,” says Mr. Peanutbutter, his voice uncharacteristically gentle. “Let’s go out.”

He leads the way as the trio walk into the room, with Princess Carolyn and Diane right behind him. Diane is staring at the ground, keeping her distance from him, arms folded over her body, uncomfortable; Mr. Peanutbutter is frowning at him, as though concerned; Princess Carolyn gives him an apologetic grimace.

Diane sighs. “How much do you remember?”

“...Pretty much nothing,” he mutters in answer, moving a hand to his forehead. “What happened?”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Listen, uh,” begins Princess Carolyn. “Herb, um, he found those pills you’d been hiding, and you got into an argument about it…”

BoJack’s blood runs cold.

“It, uh…” Mr. Peanutbutter rubs the back of his neck. “It got physical. And Herb called us to take you here so you could ... cool down.”

“And sober up,” adds Diane bluntly.

“And get your shit together,” says Princess Carolyn.

BoJack gulps. “Is -- Is he okay?”

_ “Why _ would he be okay?!” snaps Diane. “He’s been worried  _ sick  _ about you for  _ months --  _ literally, he’s actually  _ thrown up  _ from stress, not that you would  _ know  _ with how  _ high  _ you always are -- and now this!” 

Guilt washes over BoJack. “I-I mean, is he hurt? Like, is it  _ bad,  _ or --”

“Sorry,” says Diane. “I should have realised you just wanted to be reassured that you hadn’t  _ actually  _ hurt him so you don’t have to feel guilty.”

“That’s not what -- I --”

Princess Carolyn cuts him off with a sigh. “Herb’s pretty bruised up but nothing major. No broken bones or anything. Todd’s with him.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“He, uh…” says Mr. Peanutbutter uneasily. “He wanted us to pass on a message to you. When you wake up.”

BoJack gulps. “What is it?”

The three exchange nervous glances, each willing the others to start the conversation because none of them want to be the one to tell him. “Basically,” says Princess Carolyn. “You need to get your shit together.”

There’s a short pause. “Justifiable,” says BoJack.

“There’s more.”

“I thought there might be.”

“He, uh…” Diane begins. She takes a deep breath. “He said you  _ have  _ to get professional help. And you have to take it seriously, and make an effort to get better, because that’s the only way you can make this right.”

“And if you’re not willing to do that, well…” says Princess Carolyn. The implications are clear.

BoJack lies back down on the couch. “Oh.”

“Oh?!” chokes Diane. “That’s all you have to say?!”

Mr. Peanutbutter places a hand on her shoulder. “Give him a break. He doesn’t even remember it.”

“So?! Of course  _ you  _ would…” She takes a deep breath. “No. I’m not having this argument right now.”

Mr. Peanutbutter opens his mouth for a retort, but he’s interrupted by the loud ringing of Princess Carolyn’s phone. She answers it, participating in a brief conversation with whoever it is, and then hangs up and grabs her purse. 

“I am  _ so  _ sorry,” she says, in a tone that seems to imply that she’s, at best, moderately sorry. “But I have to go to North Carolina  _ right now.” _

She leaves before anyone can argue against her, leaving BoJack alone with Diane and Mr. Peanutbutter.

“Well,” says Diane. “Herb said that…” She sighs. “That we’re meant to call him once you decide you’re going to get your shit together. Until then, he’s not talking to you.”

“God,” says BoJack hollowly. “Give me some time.”

“Some time?!” chokes Diane incredulously. “I feel like it’s obvious --”

“Diane,” says Mr. Peanutbutter. Somehow, that’s all he needs to say. The room falls silent, and BoJack thinks.

* * *

You could hear a pin drop in the house. Neither of its occupants know what to say, now that the initial sobbing has stopped. They’re not sure if it’s the calm before the storm or the calm after.

“Look, uh…” Todd rubs the back of his neck nervously. “I’m sure it’s all gonna be okay.”

“I know, it’s just …  _ God _ , I can’t believe everything’s going so  _ wrong.”  _ He slams his head down onto the table. “Everything’s falling apart, Todd.”

“Hey, we’ll figure it out.” He places a hand on Herb’s shoulder. “BoJack’s gonna sober up, and then everything will be okay.”

“God, I hope so.” He rests his head in his shaking hands and tries to take deep breaths. “I could have prevented this. If I’d found the drugs before it was too late, then he wouldn’t have blown up like … like  _ that.” _

“You did everything you could. It’s not your fault he … flew off the handles.”

“I’ve  _ never  _ seen him like that before.” The memory of the previous night gets him trembling all over again. “Like, he’s been  _ angry  _ before, but not like  _ that.  _ He normally just, I don’t know, yells a bit or goes to the bar. Last night he was so … so  _ furious,  _ it was…” 

The tears well up in his throat before he can stop them, and he finds himself sobbing into his hands.  _ “God,  _ I’m a mess.”

_ “You’re  _ a mess? Uh,  _ he’s  _ the one with problems. You’re just tired out from having to deal with him all the time.”

“I don’t ‘deal with him’, I  _ love  _ him!”

“...So did I,” says Todd meekly. Herb looks up and he elaborates. “As a friend, of course. I loved being his roommate, and he was my best friend. I still care about him. But he always has a lot going on, and it’s too much for one person to carry all of that for him. That’s why I moved out.”

“I’ve been living with him this whole time, though. I should have been able to find the drugs, I should have stopped this.”

“Look, Herb, you don’t  _ get  _ it.” Todd sighs. “Try looking at it this way. What were you doing before you found the drugs and he flipped out? Like, what was the thing that was stressing you out the most?”

“Trying to find the drugs,” says Herb. “Obviously.”

“And before that? Like, before you could tell he was high all the time?”

“He broke his arm and I had to hide the painkillers so he wouldn’t get addicted again.”

Todd’s eyes widen. “And before he broke his arm?”

“He was in withdrawal from the first painkillers, when he hurt his back.”

Todd gives him a look. “And these are the recent life events that have been causing you the most stress?”

Herb’s face falls. “It’s not like  _ that,  _ it’s …”

“Not like  _ what?” _ He sighs. “You love BoJack. And I’m sure he loves you too. But he  _ always  _ has his own shit going on, and you  _ always  _ try to make it your job to fix everything. But you  _ can’t  _ fix him, Herb. You’re just burning yourself out.”

“I can’t just  _ abandon  _ him,” says Herb. “If I don’t help him, who will?”

“His friends, probably. But what he needs is  _ professional  _ help. You can’t give him that, and even if you could, it’s not your job. If you’re going to stay with him, you need to learn how to support him without going too far and trying to make it your job to save him.”

Herb sighs. “God, I guess you’re right.”

Todd’s phone buzzes with an incoming text, and he grimaces apologetically when he checks it. “I’m sorry, I have to go. My sex robot became the CEO of  _ WhatTimeIsItRightNow.com  _ and that’s landing me in hot water at work. Will you be okay here on your own?”

He sniffs. “Yeah, I’ll be okay. I’ll call Mr. Peanutbutter and see if he can come over.” He pauses. “Wait, what was that about your sex robot becoming a CEO?”

Todd, of course, leaves without explanation.

* * *

Mr. Peanutbutter goes to make sure Herb’s okay, and Diane and BoJack are left alone in her pathetically tiny excuse for an apartment. Diane leans against a wall, looking at anything but BoJack, arms folded and face hard; BoJack lies back on the couch, staring blankly at the ceiling.

“...Diane?” he asks meekly, after a long silence.

“Yeah?”

“I… I think I have to go.”

She frowns. “What?”

“I mean,” he explains. “Herb said that he doesn’t want to see me until I get professional help. Maybe I should just ask him to drop off my stuff and leave L.A.”

Diane raises an eyebrow. “Where would you even go?”

“I don’t know. I have a house in Michigan that I inherited from my mom when she died, so I could always go there.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“You’re  _ really  _ going to give up your marriage  _ and  _ break Herb’s heart just because you don’t want to, I don’t know, talk about your feelings?”

“It’s more than that,” mumbles BoJack.

“What are you scared of?”

She doesn’t expect a genuine answer, but she gets one, somehow.

“I’m scared that I’ll go to AA, or rehab, or therapy, or whatever, and they’ll try to  _ fix  _ me. And maybe they’ll figure it out, somehow. I’ll kick the addictions, and I’ll recover from the depression and shit, and  _ nothing will change.  _ Because the problem isn’t that I’m an alcoholic, or an opiate addict, or that I’m depressed, the problem is that I’m a  _ bad person.” _

Diane remains silent.

“And I feel like I  _ have  _ to leave,” continues BoJack. “Because otherwise I’m just dragging Herb into my bullshit again. He’ll think I’m changing, but I’m not, because I can’t change. I’m just a bad guy.”

Diane sighs. “There’s no such thing as ‘bad guys’ or ‘good guys’. We’re all just  _ guys  _ who do good stuff sometimes and bad stuff sometimes. And all we can do is try to do more good stuff and less bad stuff, but you’re never going to be good, because you’re not bad. So you need to stop using that as an excuse.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“So?” asks Diane. “What are you going to do?”

* * *

The first five minutes go by in complete silence.

Herb sighs loudly. “Are we  _ really  _ going to do this?”

“Do what?” asks BoJack, staring out the window, because he can’t bare to look at Herb’s bruised face.

“This  _ thing,”  _ says Herb. “We always do this  _ thing  _ where we spend a forty-five minute drive sitting in silence, and then when we get there we start talking our heads off in the parking lot.”

“I mean,” BoJack mumbles. “We probably _are_ going to do that.”

Herb  _ tsks  _ irritably. “You know, Diane offered to drive you, but I wanted to do it. Because I wanted to get a chance to talk to you. About … what happened.”

There’s a long pause.

“Okay,” says Herb. “I guess we really are going to spend forty-five minutes driving in silence and then pour our hearts out in the parking lot.”

“Yeah,” says BoJack. “I guess we are.”

Another several minutes go by in silence.

“You always said you wanted to go to Malibu,” says Herb.

“Not like this.” BoJack sighs. “I’m … I’m sorry, for what it’s worth. For hurting you. I was … I was  _ so  _ high, I never would have done that normally … but that’s no excuse, okay? I’m sorry.”

“BJ, I honestly don’t care.” BoJack flinches slightly, but just as quickly reminds himself that he deserves it. “I don’t think it matters whether or not you say you’re sorry and I say I forgive you. What matters is that I  _ know  _ that this will  _ never  _ happen again.”

They spend roughly forty minutes driving in silence. Herb pulls up in the parking lot and sighs. “So should we say everything we  _ should  _ have been saying in the last forty-five minutes now, or would you prefer if we wait ‘till we’re at the door?”

“...I’m sorry,” says BoJack sincerely. “I … I should have done this long ago. I was so scared of seeking help that I let you make it your job to somehow save me, and you can’t do that. I’m sorry for putting you in that position.” He clears his throat. “And, uh… I hope you know that it wasn’t okay for me to do that, and you can’t let anyone do that to you, okay?”

“...I forgive you.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Seriously? Already?”

“Only if you don’t let it happen again.” Herb reaches over to grab BoJack’s hand. “You  _ have  _ to take this seriously, BJ. I love you and I don’t want to end this, but I  _ can’t  _ let anyone hurt me like you did last night. You  _ have  _ to sober up, and you have to  _ commit  _ to it, okay?”

“I will, I promise.”

“You  _ can’t  _ keep going like this, you  _ have  _ to change.” His voice breaks as he talks. “You  _ need  _ to be serious about this, and …” The sentence dissolves in his mouth. “God. Let’s make this quick. I don’t want to cry in public.”

BoJack unbuckles his seatbelt. “Is there anything else you need to say?”

“...Yeah,” says Herb, after a pause. “I don’t know if you remember this, but … while we were arguing last night, before things got out of control … I said something about how…” He sighs. “You said I ‘had no idea’ what you were ‘going through’, and I said that I’d been your ‘life jacket’ through everything. But you seemed determined to drown.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” says BoJack.

“No, it doesn’t.” BoJack looks up, and then immediately turns away from Herb, unable to look him in the eye. “You’re not determined to drown, you just don’t know how to swim. This is your chance to learn. And you  _ have  _ to try your hardest, and you  _ have  _ to take this seriously, because whether you mean to or not, you’re dragging me down with you.”

“I’m sorry,” says BoJack again.

“You should be. But I forgive you.”

BoJack opens his door. “I’ll, uh, I’ll write to you, I guess.”

“I’ll write back. And let me know if there’s some sort of visiting day.”

BoJack nods and steps out of the car. 

“Oh, and one more thing?” says Herb.

He turns back. “Yeah?” 

“I love you.”

BoJack’s face falls. “Why?”

“...Honestly, I’m not sure anymore. But I do, and that’s why I had to drive you here and give you another chance.”

“I love you too.” 

They finally meet each other’s eyes before BoJack closes the car door, and he walks into Pastiches.

“Hello,” he says to the receptionist. “I am BoJack Horseman. Obviously, you know who I am, because I’m very famous, and also we called ahead. And I am here…”

He takes a deep breath.

“Because I need help.”


	21. The Face of Anxiety

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack gets out of rehab.

It’s a pleasant Saturday morning in winter when the yellow Tesla pulls up in the parking lot for the second and last time.

He reaches over to open the passenger seat door and takes his phone out for the “I’m outside” text. Before he can send it, however, he hears the footsteps that make him look up, and BoJack Horseman climbs into the car.

“Long time no see,” he says, grinning.

Herb raises an eyebrow. “I saw you last week for Family & Friends day.”

“Didn’t count if I was still in rehab.”

“Why wouldn’t that count?”

“I dunno, I just wanted to say ‘Long time no see’.” He closes the door. “Do you know anywhere good to eat in Malibu?”

“Hey, I’m not the one who’s been here for the last six months.”

“Rehab doesn’t count, like I said. It’s hardly like I’ve been running around checking out the different restaurants.”

“Maybe we should just eat at home. I bet you’re  _ aching  _ to be back in Ollywoo.”

“I  _ do  _ have some people I need to catch up with.”

“Todd’s been saying he wants to talk to you,” says Herb. “Princess Carolyn too. Oh, you’ve  _ got  _ to meet Ruthie.”

“Looking forward to it. Maybe we’ll head down to Chicago and see how Diane’s doing.”

“Oh yeah, she came to visit last week. She’s on antidepressants now.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Shit, really?”

“Yeah. She was kind of hesitant at first, but I talked her into it.”

“Well, I hope they help her. Mr. Peanutbutter still pretending to be mentally ill for some weird PR thing?”

“Yeah, he’s on some tour thing at the moment. Hollyhock’s been calling me on Sundays still, she’ll be wanting to see you for sure.”

“We’ll make sure it’s the best visit she has.”

“Not a high bar.” He sighs sadly. “She doesn’t have the best luck in L.A. Maybe we could go down to Connecticut.”

“Sounds nice.”

The car’s engine roars to life and Herb reverses out of the parking spot. “Oh, and BJ?”

“Yeah?”

“I am  _ so  _ proud of you.”

BoJack smiles. “Me too.”

* * *

It’s a little hard to recognize the familiar roads after half a year of not seeing them, but it’s crystal clear when the house on the hill rolls into view. “Jesus, it’s been a while.”

“Yeah.” Herb chuckles. “It was so lonely when you first left. I was just sitting around the house, asking myself the same questions over and over, like ‘Why didn’t I prevent this?’ and ‘How did it take me so long to find the pills?’ and ‘Why does an asexual person have a sex robot?’.”

BoJack blinks. “What was that about the sex robot?”   
“Todd hijinks, the usual. But,” he continues. “After a couple weeks moping around the house, I realised I couldn’t just spend all my time waiting for you to get out.”

“I know,” interrupts BoJack. “You told me in one of the first letters, and you haven’t shut up about it since.”

Herb ignores this. “So,” he says, as though BoJack isn’t already painfully aware of this. “I decided to get a job writing for Princess Carolyn’s new show,  _ Birthday Dad.” _

“I  _ know,”  _ says BoJack irritably. “What even  _ is  _ it?”

“It’s … It’s  _ Birthday Dad,”  _ says Herb as he pulls up in their driveway, as though it’s blindingly obvious.

“Yes,” says BoJack as he undoes his seatbelt and pushes the door open. “But what’s it  _ about?” _

“It’s … It’s about Birthday Dad.”

“Yes, but … oh, forget it.” He grabs his bag and steps outside. “I hope you kept my cactus alive.”

“It’s  _ our  _ cactus, and it’s thriving. Come on.”

The two walk up to their front door together for the first time in too long. Herb leads the way, pushing the door open. BoJack follows after him, hesitating outside for a moment, but then steps inside. He stands in the doorway and his eyes widen.

_ “I’m not kidding. The pills, now!” _

_ “I told you, I’m on a system. I’m not ‘doing drugs’.” _

_ “I’m not like you. I don’t fetishize my own sadness.” _

_ “Oh no, the floor is so slippery!” _

_ “Damn it, Todd. Clean up your shit.” _

_ “So you know I yelled at Emily and called her a cunt?” _

_ “Turns out there’s a brand of heroin called BoJack.” _

He finds himself clinging to the doorframe.

_ “You are all the things that are wrong with you!” _

“...Holy shit,” he breathes out, staring at the room with wide eyes.

Herb turns back to face him, frowning. “What’s wrong?”

“Just…” He gulps. “Just not used to having to face my memories when I’m sober.” He shakes his head. “God, I’ve done so many shitty things in this house.”

“Don’t beat yourself up about it,” says Herb, placing a hand on his shoulder. “You just spent six months working on yourself so you can be a better person to make up for all of the bad stuff you used to do.”

“Maybe this is too soon,” says BoJack uncertainly. “Maybe I should go in for another six weeks.”

“Um, I did  _ not  _ just spend forty-five minutes driving you home from Malibu just so we could turn around and take you back.” He smiles. “Come on, you’ll get used to being here again. Just give it time.”

BoJack exhales a long, shaky breath. “I hope so.”

* * *

“You really don’t get it, do you? This is the real world, okay? And I’m a career gal. I don’t have time for birthdays --”

The sound itself isn’t loud, but the universal groan over it certainly is. “Cut!” yells one producer, and everybody turns to glare at the one person who would still have a sitcom theme from the 90s as their ringtone.

“Sorry,” mutters Herb meekly as he answers. “BJ, what is it?” he hisses into the phone.

“You will not  _ believe  _ who I met at the AA meeting.”

Herb groans. “I’m at work! Now all of the crew is glaring at me, and --”

“It’s Sharona.”

Herb blinks. “Sharona?”

“Yeah, she was at the meeting, and --”

“Sharona?” repeats Herb. “As in, the hair and makeup artist from  _ Horsin’ Around?  _ The one that basically owes you her career because in 1994 Sarah got into vodka on set and you took the fall for it even though you  _ knew  _ it was hers because me being outed as gay taught you that the network will never fire you?”

“Why did you tell that whole story?” asks BoJack. “I already knew what happened, I was there.”

“I was hoping my coworkers would hear and understand that this is important.” He sighs. “It’s too bad that we lost touch with her after the show got cancelled.”

“What is it with you lately and telling me things I already know?” asks BoJack. He sighs. “Ugh, it doesn’t matter. Anyway, she’s coming over later, and she’s going to cut my hair. You know, for old time’s sake.”

“That’s nice,” says Herb, grimacing. “Look, I gotta go. The crew’s getting really annoyed with me. Love you, bye.”

He hangs up before he can get a response.

* * *

He arrives home just in time to exchange greetings with Sharona as she’s on her way out, and he can’t resist the urge to run a hand through BoJack’s shorter, greyish mane. “I like it.”

“Thanks,” says BoJack shyly, trying to playfully swat the hand away. It quickly turns into a playful wrestle, which leads to them both collapsing onto the couch, entwined in each other’s arms and laughing their heads off.

“God, I missed this,” says Herb.

“Me too. Sorry for calling while you were at work.”

“It’s fine, it’s …” Herb’s face falls. “It’s fine.”

BoJack frowns. “Hey, is everything okay?”

“What? Yeah, everything’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“If everything’s fine, then what’s the ‘it’ that I’m not supposed to worry about?”

He can see the realisation on Herb’s face -- the wide eyes, the grimace as he turns away, the sigh of defeat that comes a moment later. “Just a couple of the crew guys are homophobic, that’s all.”

“God, I hate homophobes.” He groans. “Can’t you, like, sue them for discrimination or something?”

“Nah, that seems like it would have to be a whole thing. I’ll be fine.”

“You sure?” ask BoJack, slinging an arm around Herb’s shoulders. 

“Yeah, really, it’s no big deal. Like I said, don’t worry about it.”

BoJack, of course, worries about it. So does Herb. Neither say anything about it, however, and so the matter is swept under the rug.

* * *

The sign that catches their eyes at the airport isn’t half as impressive as the one they made for her when she visited L.A. for the second time. In her defence, she has a four names to work with instead of nine, and no convenient husband to hold the other half of a sign for her. It proudly displays that she is here for  _ BoJack Horseman & Herb Kazzaz  _ in cursive writing that clearly didn’t take up almost the entirety of a pen.

She almost immediately discards the sign so she can hug her brother in the most obnoxious, suffocating way possible. He protests weakly and gasps for air, but her grip is stronger than his willpower and he can’t get free until she releases him. She then does the same for Herb, and he puts up a bit more of a fight, wriggling away from her after a few moments.

“It’s great to see you guys again!” she says enthusiastically. “Thank you so much for coming!”

“Thanks for having us,” says BoJack.

“Did you get a haircut? I love it.”

“Thanks, that’s actually kind of a story, you see -- back in the 90s, I was in a very famous TV show, and a while back I bumped into our hairdresser from --”

“Don’t tell the whole story,” says Hollyhock, playfully nudging him in the ribs. 

She leads them over to her car and BoJack’s eyes widen. “Jeez, when did you get your license?”

“I officially got it a few months back,” she explains as she opens the door. She grimaces apologetically. “I know we planned for it to just be us three, but is it okay if I go pick up my friend Tawnie on the way? She’s super into  _ Philbert  _ and really wanted to meet you in person.”

BoJack opens his mouth to protest, but Herb smirks widely and wriggles his eyebrows at Hollyhock. “Oh, Tawnie.”

“...Yeah,” says Hollyhock, rubbing the back of her neck nervously. “Tawnie. You know, my friend.”

“The cute one?” presses Herb. “The one you talked about for two hours straight on the last phone call?”

“I did not,” protests Hollyhock, crossing her arms.

“You’re right, you didn’t talk about her for two hours  _ straight,  _ because there was nothing  _ straight  _ about it.”

“Oh my God,” moans Hollyhock, looking away in embarrassment. “You sound like six of my dads.” At his raised eyebrow, she adds, “The other two think she’s rude.”

“Oh,” says BoJack, beginning to share Herb’s smirk as he realises what he’s referring to. “Are you gonna ask her out?”

“Pfft,” says Hollyhock in overexaggerated denial. “I do  _ not  _ even like her, her hat is, like, dumb. Besides, she probably doesn’t even  _ like  _ girls. I mean, yesterday, I said to her, ‘Hey, are you Google? Because you’re everything I’m searching for’ and she just said, ‘Google isn’t everything you’re searching for, it’s what you use to  _ find  _ everything you’re searching for’.”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “You’ve literally been using pick-up lines on her but you expect us to believe you don’t like her?”

“She has a point,” adds Herb. “I never did understand that pick-up line.”

“And I mean,” continues Hollyhock. “Like, I guess she got me flowers last week, but girls do that for their friends all the time.”

Herb launches into a mysterious loud coughing fit that sounds suspiciously like the words “useless lesbians”. 

“Anyway,” asks Hollyhock. “Can Tawnie come with us? Our drama professor got hired in some regional commercial, and Tawnie’s really upset because nobody else has applied to teach drama and she might have to change her major.”

“Hmm,” says Herb. “Kinda weird that is, hey? I bet there’s  _ loads  _ of actors that would kill to teach somewhere like this.” He nudges BoJack in the ribs.

“Herb!” hisses BoJack. “We can’t just up and move to Connecticut, you have a job!”

“I’m just saying,” says Herb. “We could make it work long-distance --”

Hollyhock clears her throat loudly. “Can Tawnie come or not?”

Herb stops dead in the middle of his sentence, his face a shade of scarlet. “Uh, yeah, sure, Tawnie can come.”

“Yeah,” agrees BoJack. “That’s fine.”

* * *

He drags the painting inside. “I realized I never got you a baby shower gift, so here.”

Princess Carolyn rolls his eyes. “I'm registered at Cubs 'R' Us and Baby Hole, but thanks.”

BoJack chuckles nervously. “I’m trying to get rid of things that remind me of my old life, before I was sober.”

Princess Carolyn ignores this, talking only to the young porcupine that crawls on the floor. “Look what Uncle BoJack brought you, Ruthie. It's … a 1970s pop art interpretation of the Narcissus myth.” She sighs. “How appropriate for a baby.”

“Narcissus?” asks BoJack. “I thought the painting was about me.” He shakes his head. “But enough about your baby, I also have a favor to ask.”

“Of course you do.”

BoJack ignores this. “There's this drama professor job at Wesleyan. They need a reference to tell them that I know what I'm talking about, that I'm dependable and passionate. So, I thought that you could do what you've been doing for 20 years and lie about me.”

Princess Carolyn sighs. “I'll be back at the office tomorrow. But have them call my cell because my assistant is terrible.”

Ruthie unsteadily rises to her legs and takes a few shaky steps before she falls back to the ground.

“Oh shit,” says BoJack. “it walks already?”

“She started a few days ago,” Princess Carolyn answers, and then she sniffles.

“It's okay,” says BoJack reassuringly. “she sucks at it now, but she'll get better at it.”

“I'm gonna miss everything,” she sobs. “We have this connection now. What if that goes away

when I go back to work?”

“So don't go back.”

“What?” She looks at him as though he’s just suggested that she set herself on fire. “I'm  _ dying  _ here, BoJack. I need my job. I love my job.”

“Okay, it's just... There's always so much stupid bullshit to take care of there. Aren't you the boss? Why are  _ you  _ doing the stupid bullshit?”

“I don't know.”

“Hey, my only responsibility right now is to not drink and I'm barely getting by. You are producing a show, running a company, catering to your clients, raising a child, a Todd... You need your own Princess Carolyn to take care of you.”

“...Hmm,” says Princess Carolyn. She sighs. “You might be right. Look, I’ll try to get you the job at Wesleyan, okay?”

“Thanks. And, uh, good luck.”

“You too. For the job.”

“Thanks, I’ll need it.” He rises to his feet and exits.

* * *

He’s not needed for anything at this specific moment, all of his tasks have been completed, and his phone is on silent so it can’t disturb anyone -- yet somehow, the mere sight of him taking his phone out of his pocket is enough to earn him several glares and malicious sarcastic comments. He does his best to ignore them and checks his phone anyway. His sole notification is a text from BoJack.

It’s a poorly-lit selfie taken at an odd angle, depicting BoJack wearing a light blue button-up shirt and an olive green jacket. The caption is an irritatingly long rant about how someone spilled coffee on him on the plane and he had to change, quickly followed by the news that he’s in Connecticut.

“Who are you texting?” asks the sound technician, in a voice that very clearly communicates that she knows exactly who he’s texting. There’s something about that sound technician that manages to make Herb’s blood run cold, something about her that makes him sick to his stomach. She carelessly looks over his shoulder to see who he’s texting, and scoffs. “When are you going to  _ grow out  _ of this  _ gay  _ thing?”

Herb’s heart skips several beats, and his first impulse is to stand up and leave. He ignores this impulse, and instead sends BoJack several heart emojis. He adds in a gay pride flag emoji, too, to show that stupid-ass sound technician that he’s not going to show any restraint in his affection just becasue she’s looking.

He’s tempted to turn around and look her dead in the eye as he hits send, but that would probably be more trouble than it’s worth. He instead pretends he can’t see her at all as he sends the message, and hopes she can’t tell how much of his confidence is entirely fabricated. He hopes she can’t sense his anxiety, can’t hear the frantic pounding of his heart.

God knows he can.

* * *

Her heart pounds like it’s going to pop out of her chest, so loud that she’s sure everyone else can hear it. Each frantic breath feels like an impossible task -- are her lungs constricting, or is there just not enough air in here? God, can people tell that she’s panicking? Of course they can, they can probably hear just her heartbeat, they’re probably all laughing at her,  _ why couldn’t this just be fun? _

“Oh! What do you see?”

“What?” she stutters out. She finds herself standing face to face with a young African-American man, with his head shaved on both sides but a little longer on top, staring at her with concerned eyes and holding a bottle.

“You're having an anxiety attack,” he explains. “so look around the room and tell me what you see.”

The girl looks around anxiously. “I-I see people partying and passing out!”

“What else do you see?”

“Um…” She looks a little more thoroughly. “... books. Pizza boxes. I see light fixtures. I see an odd amount of floor poofs.”

“Okay, now say your name.”

“Hollyhock.”

“Last name too.”

She chuckles. “No, we'll be here all night.”

“You feel any calmer?”

“...Yeah, actually,” she mumbles. “A little bit.”

“It's a trick my psychiatrist taught me,” explains the man. “It's supposed to help you ground yourself.”

“Thanks.”

“Except for the saying your name part. That's not really part of it. I just wanted to know your name.” He pauses. “I-I'm Peter, by the way. Just so you don't have to wait for me to have an anxiety attack too.”

Hollyhock, on autopilot, places a hand over her heart. “Hollyhock.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Oh.” She chuckles. “Right.”

“So,” suggests Peter. “this party's kind of crowded. You wanna go get some air?”

“Yeah. But it's pretty cold out.”

“Oh, yeah, that's true.”

There’s a long, ominous pause.

“But we're wearing jackets!”

“Also true.”

The two go outside together. They lean against the outer wall as Hollyhock attempts to drink. She gulps down a sip, then bursts out coughing violently. 

“You're not even supposed to like it yet,” says Peter encouragingly. “It tastes okay-er over time.”

“Yeah,” says Hollyhock. “I'm kind of aspiring to be okay-er over time myself.”

“Hey, don’t be like that,” says Peter reassuringly. “You seem fine right now.”

“I guess,” says Hollyhock, staring down at the ground. She opts to change the subject. “The public transport is so crowded in New York.”

“Yeah,” agrees Peter. “I’m kinda used to it now, though. I still haven’t gotten my driver’s license. I had some shit go down in high school, and... You know, there was this girl in my town.” He shakes his head. “Anyway, it's a long story.”

Hollyhock looks up. “No, I wanna hear it.”

He hesitates. “Okay. She had this gay couple that I think were friends with her parents or something, and in senior year they visited her.”

Hollyhock frowns. “Does them being gay actually relate to this story, or did you just feel the need to specify that they are because being straight is the default?”

“I don’t know, it’s kind of easier to explain why they were visiting together if they’re married.

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Okay,” continues Peter. “So this girl was best friends with my girlfriend. We all went to prom together -- me, my girlfriend, and the girl. But the girl was really upset about her crush not asking her out, so one of the men visiting agreed to go to prom as her ‘date’ to make her feel better.”

Hollyhock’s eyes widen. “Wait, the man went to prom with you? Yeesh.”

“That's not even the yeesh-iest part. The girl, she was still learning to drive and she wanted to practice as much as possible, so she drove us all. We left early and we decided to just go for a drive around, and then we hit a tree.”

Hollyhock gasps. “Were you okay?!”

“Yeah! Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it was scary in the moment. I got whiplash, and the girl got concussed pretty badly. The man that was visiting, I think he broke a couple ribs, but I never saw him again. I later found out that his car had dodgy brakes the whole time and that’s why we crashed.”

There’s a long, ominous pause.

“And I was pretty traumatized for a while,” continues Peter. “B-But things are good now. Things are good. Because at some point, I realized it wasn't the girl’s fault, or Maddy's fault, or my fault. It was just some shitty dudes, you know?”

“Totally.”

“But you know the craziest part of all?” He forces a small laugh. “The guys, they’re actually kinda famous.”

“Really?”

“Yeah,” he explains. “I never heard of them, but it turns out one of them’s kind of a movie star. But the thing is, before the movie, he was in some super famous sitcom in the 90s, and his husband created the sitcom.” 

“Wow,” says Hollyhock. “Who were they?”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

“...Who were they?”


	22. A Series of Lesbian Vignettes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tawnie and Hollyhock's lives during their semester at Wesleyan in which BoJack is the new drama professor.

“Then,” explains Tawnie. “He said ‘class dismissed’, even though we still had over an hour of class time left, and then tried to pretend he was ‘acting’ again.”

Hollyhock groans emphatically and flops down onto the bed. “Can we  _ please  _ not talk about BoJack right now?”

“Okay, sure. Have you watched  _ Philbert  _ yet?”

Hollyhock gives her a look.

“Relax, I’ll let you know when the nude scene’s coming up so you can look away.”

“I  _ just  _ said I don’t want to talk about BoJack.”

“And we won’t! We’ll talk about  _ Philbert,  _ and also maybe a little about BoJack’s dick.”

“That’s worse, though.” She raises an eyebrow at Tawnie. “Do you not get how that’s worse?”

“Fine,” says Tawnie, pouting childishly. “What about  _ Birthday Dad?” _

“No point. His husband’s one of the writers, I’ll just be sitting there the whole time thinking about which jokes were his idea.”

Tawnie frowns. “Why do you hate thinking about BoJack so much anyway? You were in love with him up until that party.”

_ “Whaaaat?”  _ says Hollyhock in overexaggerated confusion. “What are you  _ talking  _ about?” 

“You kept babbling on about how cool it was to finally have a brother and how worried you were that he was in withdrawal…”

“Pfft, as if,” insists Hollyhock. She stands up. “Well, I gotta go and, uh, splitsville to the … lavatory … gotta go!” She backs out of the room. “Love you! Love being heterosexual!”

She exits swiftly, and Tawnie stares at the door that she left through. “Damn,” she mutters quietly. “If she’s heterosexual, maybe I should move on to another girl.”

* * *

She barely has a clue what’s going on in the game, and honestly, she’d much rather be at home rewatching  _ Philbert  _ or catching up on  _ Birthday Dad.  _ But there’s something about the young horse girl with the white diamond that keeps her coming to these stupid games, keeps her pretending she knows what a try is.

BoJack is there, of course, to congratulate Hollyhock on her good playing even though it’s clear he doesn’t know nearly enough about the game to tell whether or not she’s a good player. He offers to celebrate with her.

“Sorry,” she says, politely but firmly. “But the team does this thing where we go to a bar to celebrate when we win.” She turns to Tawnie. “You wanna come?”

“Can I come?” asks BoJack.

“Oh,” says Hollyhock, grimacing. “We’re only allowed to take one friend with the team, so if you wanted to meet us there, you’d have to drive there, and…”

She trails off as though implying something, but BoJack just raises an eyebrow. “I mean, my car’s back in L.A., but I can get a cab or something.”

“Just be careful,” she says. “If you do drive. You know, make sure the brakes work.”

She takes Tawnie’s hand and walks off. Tawnie raises an eyebrow. “I mean, thanks for choosing me over him, but what’s going on? Are you angry at him?”

“A little,” she admits.

“Why? Did something happen?”

“Something happened years ago and I only just found out … but it doesn’t matter, okay? It’s no big deal.”

“If you insist. But you know, if there’s a problem with BoJack, you should talk to him.”

Hollyhock sighs. “I know.”

Tawnie stares down at their intertwined hands, but says nothing.

* * *

She flops down onto the bed. “It's so unfair that students have to have their phones on silent and professors don't.”

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow. “Professors are meant to have their phones on silent too.”

“Not BoJack. Yesterday his phone started ringing really loudly in the middle of a lecture. He just checked it and said, ‘Sorry, this is my husband, but he  _ knows  _ I'm teaching a class right now, so he can shove it up his cancerous and/or autistic ass’, and I was all like, ‘Ok boomer’.”

Hollyhock groans. “Please don't ‘ok boomer’ my brother.”

“He  _ is  _ a boomer though.”

“I know, I just … I don't want to talk about him.”

Tawnie frowns. “What's going on with you two? Are you having a fight, or… ?”

Hollyhock sighs. “Remember that guy I met at the party in New York? Peter?”

“...Yeah?” says Tawnie cautiously.

“He … knew BoJack and Herb.” She frowns, turning away from Tawnie. “Apparently when Peter was a teenager, BoJack and Herb were visiting a friend of his or something, and they ended up driving in BoJack’s car. And then they crashed, and everyone was okay, but -- the car had dodgy brakes, and they knew, but they let a bunch of teenagers drive anyway.”

There's a long, ominous pause.

“I think you should talk to BoJack about this.”

Hollyhock sighs. “You're right. Thanks for listening. I love you, Tawnie.”

“Love you too.” Tawnie pauses, blushing. “As a friend, right?”

“...Yeah,” says Hollyhock. She chuckles nervously. “I, uh, gotta go do some, uh… straight stuff. Bye!”

* * *

“Honestly,  _ screw  _ the sound effects guy.”

Hollyhock raises an eyebrow. “Who?”

“In my class,” explains Tawnie. “He's this guy who does a bunch of sound effects, and it's basically his whole thing.”

“And what did he do?” 

“He broke my basil.”

Hollyhock bursts into a fit of laughter.  _ “What?!” _

“Don't laugh,” says Tawnie, crossing her arms. “I've been holding a leaf of basil everywhere I go to clean my soul and essence.”

This, somehow, doesn't make Hollyhock take the matter any more seriously -- in fact, it causes her to burst into another fit of giggles. When she finally ceases laughing, she manages to say, “If that’s how you clean your soul and essence, I don’t want to know how you clean your room.”

Tawnie ignores this. “And the sound effects guy just broke it! He is the  _ worst.” _

“Why’d he break it?”

“I dunno.” She pulls a face. “It is so homophobic that people won’t respect my soul-cleaning practices.”

Hollyhock’s heart flutters. “Are you gay?”

Tawnie blushes slightly, looking at the ground. “I might be?” She shrugs. “I’m kind of questioning at the moment.”

“Wow,” mumbles Hollyhock, rubbing the back of her neck nervously. “I like girls too. Wouldn’t it be crazy if we liked each other?”

“...Yeah, that’d be  _ crazy.” _

They lean closer to each other, staring into each other’s eyes. There’s a long, painful silence.

“So,” says Tawnie. “Did you see that  _ GirlCroosh  _ article on  _ Birthday Dad?  _ Apparently one of the sound technicians --”

“I don’t want to hear it, Tawnie,” interrupts Hollyhock. She groans.

* * *

Her phone buzzes with missed calls and texts from Tawnie, but she doesn’t connect the dots until she hears the knock on her door. “BoJack?” Her eyes widen. “Oh, shit, your showcase! Tawnie's gonna be so pissed!”

He glares. “Forget Tawnie. I'm pissed! And it's happening  _ right now.” _

“I'm sorry. I forgot. I know your students just have to do a scene, but I have multiple final papers.”

This does nothing to pacify his anger. “If you're implying acting is a bullshit major, you're right. But people came all the way from California to see my showcase. From Chicago. Herb managed to come, and he’s … look, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but he’s going through some shit right now. And he came, but you can't even walk across campus?”

She groans. “Okay, let me put some pants on.”

“You've been avoiding me all semester.”

She swears her heart skips a beat. “I just have a lot going on. I go to school here. I'm a college student.”

He frowns. “I thought I'd see you more.”

“This was mine before you got here.” Frustration peaks within her. “This was  _ my  _ life,  _ my  _ world, and you just, like,  _ live  _ here now. And you could have asked me, by the way.”

“Okay,” snaps BoJack. “I'm sorry. I guess I thought my  _ sister--” _

“No,” she cuts him off. “don't say that. Like it means something.”

“It  _ does  _ mean something.”

“We don't know each other, really.”

His face falls. “What?”

“No,” she insists. “I'm just saying it's fine. I had a life before I met you, and you had a life before you met me.”

“I don't want that life. That life, that person? That's not who I am, I --” He sighs. ”I'm sorry I came here without asking you first. That was selfish.”

“Okay. Thank you.”

He rubs the back of his neck. “If this is too weird for you, I don't have to come back next semester. I can get a job somewhere else.”

Hollyhock shakes her head. “Tawnie says you’re a good teacher, and I -- I wouldn’t want her and all the other acting students to suffer just because of me. Sorry for snapping at you.”

“It’s fine,” insists BoJack. “You know, uh, you can still make the showcase if you’re quick. But I mean, if you’re too busy, that’s fine…”

Hollyhock grimaces apologetically. “I’m really swamped with work at the moment. Is someone filming it?”

“Yeah, I’ll send you the video.”

“Okay. And, uh, say hi to Herb for me.”

BoJack’s face falls. “I told you, he’s going through some shit at the moment.”

“Yeah,” she says optimistically. “But he’ll be okay.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Are  _ you  _ going through some shit?”

“Yeah, but…” She sighs. “Yeah.”


	23. Damaged Goods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> During BoJack's first semester as a professor, Herb struggles to cope with being universally hated by his coworkers.

He’s halfway through a lecture when he’s cut off by the loud ringing of his phone. He groans in annoyance -- he was  _ sure  _ he remembered to put it on silent. “Sorry,” he says to the hall of smirking students. “Let me go check if that’s important.”

He marches over to his desk and picks up his ringing phone. With a sigh, he shows the lock screen to the students. “Sorry, this is my husband, but he  _ knows  _ I’m teaching a class right now, so he can shove it up his cancerous and/or autistic ass.”

Several students question this choice of phrasing and are ignored. Some laugh to themselves, but it quickly dies down in favour of continuing the lesson as quickly as possible so the professor doesn’t make them stay late again. Tawnie adjusts her beanie and looks BoJack Horseman directly in the eye.

“Ok boomer.”

* * *

It goes to voicemail.

In the few seconds it takes for his phone to explain to him that the number he has dialed is not currently available, he realises with a jolt that of  _ course  _ he can’t answer, he’s at work. He still grips the phone like it’s a lifeline, waiting eagerly for the tone that indicates he can leave a message. He mentally rehearses what he’s going to say in the voicemail, how he’s going to put it all into words. 

When the tone sounds, his mouth is dry, and he can’t seem to make himself talk. He hangs up.

He sits there, in his car, parked in the driveway of his house. He should probably get out of the car and go inside at some point.

But once he gets out of the car, he has to accept that he’s gone home, as opposed to just going for a quick drive on his lunch break. As long as he stays parked in the driveway, he can tell himself that he’s just going for a drive and he’ll be back at the set in a few minutes to review the scripts.

If he’s going to be back at the set in a few minutes, he should probably start driving over there now. Instead he continues to scroll through his contacts with shaking hands. Why is he shaking? 

He’s  _ fine,  _ really. Hesitantly, he calls Diane.

“Hey,” says Diane.

“Hey,” replies Herb.

There’s a long, painful silence.

“What’s up?” asks Diane.

“...Nothing much.”

“Then why are you calling? You don’t normally call for no reason.”

“...I don’t know,” he admits in an unsteady voice.

Diane pauses. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He gulps. “So, uh, how’s Chicago?”

“Annoyingly cold, as always. Guy’s been good.”

“Good to hear. How’s your book going?”

“Oh, it’s sort of turned into a middle-grade fiction series.”

Herb blinks. “What? How’d that happen?”

“It’s a long story.”

“The book, or the story of how it became a middle-grade fiction series?”

“How it became a middle-grade fiction series. The book itself is actually pretty short.”

“Makes sense, kids have short attention spans .What’s it about?”

She chuckles. “Basically, it’s about this Vietnamese-American teenage girl named Ivy Tran, and she solves mysteries in the mall.”

“Oh, the mall-related mysteries.” He frowns. “You seemed pretty into that book of memoirs, though. What changed?”

She gives a slight nervous laugh. “I don’t know, I guess it was one of those ideas that seemed great in theory but just didn’t work out in practice.” She chuckles. “Tough work being a writer, huh?”

The tears well up in his eyes without warning, and before he has a chance to attempt any sort of self-soothing strategy he’s a complete sobbing mess. “Herb?!” asks Diane anxiously. “What’s wrong?”

He gasps in a few deep breaths. “I-I’m fine,” he insists. “Oh my God, I don’t know why I started crying. Just don’t worry about it, okay? I’m … I’m fine.”

Diane pauses. “You  _ really  _ expect me to believe that?” When Herb remains silent, she adds, “Come on, you can talk to me. Is it something about BoJack? Did he do something?”

“No, it’s not BJ, it’s -- it’s just work stuff, and it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

“It doesn’t  _ sound  _ like nothing.” She sighs. “Look, Herb, it’s obvious that there’s something wrong. Is there anything I can do to help, or … ?”

_ “No!”  _ he snaps. “I -- There’s nothing going on, and even if there was, you couldn’t do anything about it. I don’t…” His voice breaks as he talks. “I don’t know  _ why  _ I called you.”

Diane remains silent for a long time. “Yeah,” she says gently after a long pause. “I think you do.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

Herb sighs. “Sorry I snapped at you. I’ve, uh. I’ve been kinda stressed lately.”

“I can tell,” she says coolly. “What’s up?”

“Nothing, really.” He hears the beginning of her objections, and continues before she can correct him. “Just a couple of my coworkers are homophobic and they’re giving me a hard time, that’s all.”

“Hmm,” says Diane. “Can’t you talk to HR?”

“I tried, it, uh …” He gulps. “It didn’t go too well.”

Diane pauses. Her voice drops in a conspiratorial tone. “You know, a  _ lot  _ of people are gay. If word somehow got out that the makers of  _ Birthday Dad  _ were homophobic…”

Herb wipes his eyes. “That  _ would  _ damage the ratings, yeah.”

“I might have some old friends from when I worked at  _ GirlCroosh,  _ they can publish the story. Tell you what, just type out everything that’s happened and I’ll do the work for you, okay?”

He forces a smile. “...Okay.”

* * *

His fingers clack on the keyboard.

_ Hello. I am Herb, and I was the head writer for the popular 90s sitcom “Horsin’ Around” and ever since I was that, I wanted to write good things that were good (this is not good, FIX THIS LATER) _

He attempts to rewrite the sentence several times before landing on the “FIX THIS LATER” approach, trying to just get a coherent sentence, but eventually he gives up and writes the note for himself to fix it later. His phone rings -- presumably Diane, asking when he’s going to have something that she can anonymously email to someone at  _ GirlCroosh  _ to make an actual article. He ignores it.

_ That’s why I decided to join the writing team for the new “Birthday Dad” series. I was disappointed to find that I was constantly being met with inappropriate references toward my sexuality in the workplace. On my first day at the job, the sound technician introduced herself, and immediately stated that she was hoping I had ‘grown out’ of my orientation since the famous “Horsin’ Around” scandal. (Do we need to find out her name? Check if you need to include her name. ) _

_ Anyway, she’s a real bitch to me, but maybe she’s been bullied too, and that’s why? (Is any of this significant?( _

_ I remember seeing my male coworkers step away from me as though weary I might be attracted to them. (Is that actually homophobic? I mean, they’re allowed to be uncomfortable, I can’t fault them for that. _

_ Is that something? Is any of this anything? _

His phone rises in volume until he can’t force himself to ignore it. He barely even looks at the lock screen as he answers the call and snaps, “I’m not finished yet, but I’m writing it  _ right now _ , okay?”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Uh…” mutters BoJack. “Did you think I was your coworker or something?”

Herb’s heart skips a beat. “Oh my God, sorry, I didn’t realise it was just you.”

“You okay?” asks BoJack cautiously. “I’ve tried to call you, like, five times.”

“What are you talking about? I haven’t … oh.” He goes into his notifications and discovers five missed calls from BoJack. “Shit, sorry.”

“You called me in the middle of my lecture when you  _ knew  _ I had a class, and then didn’t pick up the phone for a week.” It’s hard to tell if he’s angry or concerned, but it makes guilt bubble up in Herb’s stomach regardless. “What’s going on?”

“I guess I’ve been a little distracted lately,” he mumbles. “You know, work stuff.” He forces a chuckle.

“Tell me about it. I’ve had six kids so far throw goddamned tantrums when I tried to give them constructive criticism on their acting. Two of them even tried to prove a point by waltzing into my AA meeting and doing some ridiculous parody of an alcoholic.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. But that’s teaching for you, huh?”

“...Yeah,” mutters Herb distractedly.

“You sure you’re okay? You sound a little off.”

“I’m good. Just work stuff.” It’s technically not a lie. “I’ve gotta go. I have a deadline coming up.” That, on the other hand, most definitely  _ is  _ a lie, but what choice does he have? 

“Oh yeah, I love deadlines. I love the whooshing sound they make when they fly past me.” He laughs a little. “Good thing we’ve got ghostwriters, huh?”

“I have to go, BJ.”

BoJack sounds a little taken aback by his terseness. “Uh, yeah, sure. I’ll call you back when you’re not so busy.”

“Yeah, okay, call me back. Talk to you later.”

“Bye. Love you.”

Herb gulps. “Love you too. Bye.”

He hangs up and glances at the screen of his laptop, at the borderline incoherent, absolute  _ mess  _ that he’s written.

_ God, this is hopeless. _

He closes the laptop without bothering to save the document or turn it off properly. “What am I  _ doing?”  _ he mutters to himself, shaking his head. He leaves the laptop on the bench, not knowing or caring whether it’s going to run out of battery. He stares blankly at the wall ahead of him.

“What am I  _ doing?” _

* * *

_ All adults can agree that having a stable work environment is part of the key to a successful career. When you feel safe in the workplace, you can thrive and work toward being the best possible version of yourself. _

_ But that’s the problem. I don’t feel safe at work. _

_ (name examples of them being homophobic) _

_ There was the time we played Uno together on our lunch break and the sound technician kept making up rules so I wouldn’t win because nobody wanted to be beaten by ‘a queer’. _

_ (is that it?) _

_ There were other things. There’s lots of shit, constantly. I just can’t express it _

_ (is this all this is? Just complaining? _

“It is  _ so  _ unfair that I’m being made to feel like a  _ Karen  _ just because I want extra salt on exactly thirty per cent of my chips!”

Herb blinks. “Uh, what?”

“The KFC cashier gave me  _ such  _ a dirty look yesterday,” Sarah explains, which doesn’t explain much. She leans over on the couch and glances at his screen. “What are you writing?”

“Nothing!” he says hurriedly, shutting the laptop.

She frowns. “You okay?”

“I’m  _ fine,”  _ he insists. “I don’t know  _ why  _ I invited you over.”

“Yeah,” says Sarah. “You do.”

Before he can argue, his phone starts ringing loudly. When he sees the name on the lock screen, a part of him is tempted to ignore it. But he answers anyway. “BJ?”

“Herb,” says BoJack immediately, audibly relieved. “You haven’t been answering my calls. I was getting worried.”

“Sorry,” he mutters guiltily.

BoJack remains silent for a long time. “Are you angry?” He’s not accusing, nor scared, but a part of his voice seems to be pleading.

“What? No! I’m just a little stressed with work.”

“Are you sure?” insists BoJack. “You’ve barely talked to me for the last few weeks, and you’re  _ never  _ like this.”

“Trust me, I’m…” He’s about to say that he’s fine, but a part of him knows BoJack won’t be fooled. “Look, I’ve been stressed lately, but I promise it’s not your fault, okay?”

“...Okay. I trust you.” He breathes a sigh of relief. “And if I  _ do  _ do something wrong, then you’ll tell me, right?”

“Yeah, I’ll tell you if I have a problem.” He frowns. “Is something wrong? You seem panicky.”

“Well, yeah, my  _ husband’s  _ been avoiding me and not explaining why, and I thought you were angry.” He pauses, then sighs. “No, sorry, I shouldn’t be blaming you. It’s just -- Hollyhock’s been weirdly distant lately. I think she somehow knows about New Mexico, but she won’t be upfront with me about it.”

Herb grimaces. “Sorry for not answering your calls. Hollyhock probably just needs time.” He pauses, and a lightbulb flashes into life above him, immediately followed by Sarah explaining that she needs the light on to find something she dropped and she hopes he’s okay with it. “Can I come over?”

“Uh, to Connecticut?” asks BoJack uncertainly. “I mean, yeah, sure, but the showcase isn’t for a while…”

“I know. Just to visit. I miss you.” He picks up his laptop. “If I start packing now I might be able to get a flight today or tomorrow. I’ll text you the arrival time.”

“I might not be able to pick you up at the airport. I’ve got classes and stuff.”

“That’s fine. I can wait there for a few hours.” He hangs up before BoJack can protest, and Sarah raises an eyebrow. 

“You  _ sure  _ you’re okay?”

“Yeah,” he insists. “I’m  _ fine.” _

“You’re  _ absolutely  _ certain?”

“...Yeah,” he says uncertainly.

* * *

It’s a nice night. The sky is a deep blue, full of stars. The wind is chilly, cool enough to give them an excuse to sit close together on a park bench with arms wrapped around each other, but not cold enough to make it actually unpleasant to be outside. The crickets chirp pleasantly, making sure the peaceful silence doesn’t become too eerie or empty.

Not that Herb would know.

“What are you even typing?” asks BoJack, squinting at the laptop screen. It’s on the lowest possible brightness, and Herb can barely see what he’s typing from right in front of the screen; BoJack’s lucky if he can make out a few letters, and the small font size certainly isn’t helping.

Despite the fact that BoJack can’t read a word, Herb hurriedly tilts the laptop away from him. “Just some scripts!” he says hurriedly. “But, uh, don’t read it. You’ll interrupt my writing flow.”

“...Okay,” mutters BoJack uncertainly, and Herb’s fingers continue clacking.

_ My name’s Herb Kazzaz. I work for the writing team of Birthday Dad. The sound technician’s a real bitch to me. _

Is she? Or does he deserve it?

_ I deserve it. _

_ My problem is that I always blame other people. _

He gulps.

_ I’m trying to be nice to my coworkers. I’m trying to figure out why they won’t give me a chance. _

But he’s already figured that out, hasn’t he?

_ Maybe it’s because they’re homophobic. Or maybe not. Maybe I’m just not worthy of love. _

His breathing quickens as he searched in his mind for some sort of proof -- some evidence, something concrete that proves that it’s because he’s gay. But realistically, it  _ can’t  _ be. They can’t  _ all  _ be homophobic. There’s plenty of other reasons. Maybe they hate him because he refused to believe his husband wasn’t cheating on him until a teenage girl almost died. Maybe they hate him because he couldn’t protect his husband from spiraling into addiction. Maybe they hate him because he’s  _ him. _

_ I blame everyone else for my problems, but I’m the one constant here. _

The hand on his shoulder makes him physically jump, and he almost drops his laptop in the consequent flailing. “You’re panicking. What’s going on?”

“I --” he stutters out. Suddenly anxious that BoJack will somehow see what he’s typing, he hurriedly closes the laptop, and with shaking hands he only just manages to put it on the bench beside him. “My chest feels tight. I -- I can’t --”

“Hey, it’s okay, just breathe.” He gives Herb’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “Talk to me.”

Herb manages to draw in a few long, shaky breaths. The first time he says it, he’s quiet and uncertain. “I want to die.”

BoJack stares at him in stunned silence. “Like,” he mutters after a long pause, and he switches to a poor impersonation of a teenager, “‘Oh my God, I have so much homework, I want to die!’? Or …”

“I want to  _ die,  _ BoJack.” He buries his face in BoJack’s shirt and sobs freely. “I -- Everything’s so  _ much,  _ I, I  _ can’t,  _ I want to  _ die,  _ I…”

“Woah,” says BoJack. “I … You’re okay. Just breathe.” He runs a hand through Herb’s hair. “You don’t  _ really  _ want that.”

“I do,” insists Herb. “I -- I’m not  _ wanted,  _ I don’t  _ belong  _ anywhere, I can’t --”

“Okay,” interrupts BoJack. “But think about it like this -- there’s stuff you enjoy doing, and there’s stuff that’s gonna make you happy, and you should stick around to see it.”

Herb sniffles. “I-I don’t think it’s  _ worth  _ it,” he sobs. “I-I’m just a  _ burden  _ to everyone, and --”

“Jesus, Herb, you sound like me before I sobered up. And back then I was a complete  _ shithead,  _ and you still told me it wasn’t too late for me. Why can’t you extend some of that compassion to yourself?”

“...I don’t know,” mutters Herb uncertainly.

“Hey. Try looking at it this way. The Knicks are having a good season. Don’t you want to see how that turns out?”

Herb finally looks up and wipes his eyes. “Yeah, I-I do.”

“See? You’ve gotta stay alive for that.” He frowns. “What’s going on? I’ve never seen you this upset before.”

“J-Just my coworkers,” he sniffles. “I feel like everyone there  _ hates  _ me. It’s so …  _ lonely.” _

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “Why don’t you just quit?”

Herb shakes his head. “I’ve been miserable this long. If I quit now, it’ll all be for nothing. If I stay there, I might find some way to, I don’t know, get them to learn the error of their ways. Or Diane’s gonna help me expose them and people will boycott the show.”

“Herb, they’re making you suicidal. It’s not safe for you to stay there.”

“I’m fine,” insists Herb. “That was just a -- a  _ moment.  _ I’m not normally that depressed. I’ll be okay.”

BoJack is still frowning deeply, but he doubts his own ability to dissuade Herb. “I mean, if you’re sure. But … stay here a little longer, okay? You’ll burn yourself out. You need a break.”

“Yeah,” agrees Herb. “And, uh, maybe I’ll look at getting a therapist when I go back to L.A.” 

“That’s a good idea.” He looks up at the sky. “And you’ll call me if you need anything?”

“Yeah. I’ll call you if I need help.”

“I promise, I’ll  _ always  _ pick up.”

Herb raises an eyebrow. “Even if you have class?”

“I’ll get Hollyhock to pull the fire alarm.” He chuckles. “Take care, okay? I love you.”

“I will. Love you too.”

They look up at the stars together. “It’s a nice night,” says BoJack.

“Yeah,” agrees Herb. “It’s a nice night.”

For now, he’s agreed to keep living. But life’s still a bitch.


	24. The Pieces That Don't Quite Fit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After BoJack's semester as a drama professor at Wesleyan ends, Hollyhock sends a letter.

She pours her heart and soul into that letter.

She spends hours typing up rough drafts, checking them again and again for the smallest error in grammar. She’s not sure why, because they won’t care how bad the grammar is as long as it’s at least somewhat coherent. She can see it now -- BoJack leaning over her shoulder as she proofreads a third time and muttering, “Jeez, who died and left the grammar Nazis in charge?”

Herb, probably, would reply with, “Grammar Hindenberg, probably,” and then hi-five BoJack. But BoJack and Herb aren’t here to make jokes about how unnecessary it is to nitpick about grammar, and so she nitpicks.

When she’s finally sure that the typed version is perfect, she carefully writes it out on paper, cursive writing in black pen. She goes through several copies before she’s even satisfied that her handwriting is legible enough. She finally ends up with two satisfactory pages of explanation.

She mails the letter to L.A., where it gets put on the bench with a brief mention of reading it later, and is promptly forgotten.

* * *

He sorts carelessly through the mail. “Bill, bill, bill, fan mail, bill, fan mail, oh, shit, Hollyhock.”

Herb blinks. “Uh, what?”

“Letter from Hollyhock.” He holds up the envelope. “What do you think it is?”

“I don’t know. She’s all young and modern, why would she send a letter?”

“Eh, it’s probably no big deal.” He carelessly places it on the bench. “We’ll read it later.”

It’s promptly forgotten.

With a sigh, BoJack takes out his phone and scrolls through the article again. “I didn’t even know she still worked for _GirlCroosh.”_

“She doesn’t, but she managed to pass the information on to someone who still does.” He frowns. “I told her to wait for me to give her the OK.”

“This is good, though, isn’t it?” asks BoJack, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Ratings are going down and they might end up firing the assholes.”

“I still work there, BJ,” protests Herb. “I’ll have to go in to work tomorrow when I’ve accused them of a bunch of shit and they’ll _hate_ me for it.”

“Then don’t go to work tomorrow. It’s not like they won’t get why.”

“Diane broke my trust by not waiting for me to say it was okay.”

“That’s true,” says BoJack, frowning. “But she was trying to help -- and it _did_ end up helping. She made an executive decision.”

“She’s not an executive,” snaps Herb.

“She made a ‘my friend is in a shitty environment and if someone doesn’t do something it’s going to get worse’ decision. Besides, she already apologised, didn’t she?”

“Yeah,” mutters Herb flatly. “At the showcase. Speaking of which,” he adds, looking up. “No offense, but your students were _shit.”_

“None taken,” says BoJack. He smiles. “They’re shit but they’re less shit than they were when we started out. They’ve improved _so_ much. That showcase was the shittiest thing I ever had the displeasure of watching, and when it was done, I felt like I was going to _faint_ from pride.”

Herb frowns. “That would be really dangerous, if you did. Like, you would probably hit your head and get a concussion or something.”

“Stop changing the subject,” says BoJack. “I think maybe this is a good thing, you know. And now that you’ve exposed them, what are you even _doing_ there? Just tell them you quit, wait for everyone to get fired in a last-ditch attempt to save face, and then they’ll be begging you to come back because they need more writers.”

Herb remains silent for a long time.

“I didn’t _want_ anyone to know,” he mutters. “I was _sure_ I could handle it, that I didn’t _need_ help, and I was constantly second-guessing if it was a problem anyway. If Diane helps me fix everything now, then it was all for nothing. If I had to be miserable for that long, I should at least get to keep going until I _win.”_

 _“Win?”_ questions BoJack. “How can you _win?”_

Herb doesn’t answer.

* * *

The letter sits on the bench, forgotten, for three days.

They’re halfway through an episode of _Horsin’ Around_ when BoJack’s phone rings. Frowning, he presents the lock screen to Herb. “Unknown number. Do you think I should answer?”

“Ugh, it’s probably a telemarketer.”

“Might be university stuff.”

“Take it anyway, just to be safe.”

BoJack answers the phone. “Hello, this is BoJack Horseman, who am I speaking to?” A frown crosses his face as the caller speaks. “Oh, um, well, why are you calling?” His face falls. “...Okay. Thanks for telling me.”

He hangs up. “Who was it?” asks Herb.

BoJack ignores him, marching over to the bench. He tears open the envelope on the bench and skims through the two pages that Hollyhock wrote. “Oh God.”

“What?” asks Herb anxiously.

BoJack, wordlessly, hands him the letter. He reads through it. It starts simply, with a greeting and a brief spiel about how she _knows_ it’s weird to send letters but she had to this time. It explains that this was too important to say over the phone or by text and it couldn’t wait until BoJack’s return to Connecticut. She explains that she went to a party in New York a while ago, and …

... _Oh._

...Oh _fuck._

“Oh my _God,”_ breathes Herb as his heart drops to his stomach. He folds up the letter and puts it back on the bench. “This is all my fault.”

“How do you figure that?” asks BoJack.

“Peter. New Mexico. I should have fixed the breaks.”

 _“I_ should have fixed the breaks. You were recovering from cancer. There was no reason it should have been entirely your job.”

“So? I _knew_ you wouldn’t get around to it. I should have done it.”

BoJack remains silent for a long time. “Okay, Herb, you know what your problem is?”

“That I make a big deal about _everything?_ That I blame everyone else for my problems? That I can’t take a goddamn hint and tell when people are sick of my bullshit?”

“What? No!” He groans. “Your problem is that you’re a _good person._ You’re not _like_ me, okay? I have done _so many_ shitty things that I can barely feel it at this point. For you, New Mexico and fighting with me when Hollyhock first came are the _worst_ things you’ve ever done, and you think doing shitty things like that _means_ something about who you are as a person. It doesn’t! Jesus, Herb, if you think _I_ was a good person back then, then _you_ must be a goddamned saint!”

He’s left panting with the effort of the outburst. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have snapped at you. Point is, you’re a good person. I could fill a whiteboard with all the shitty things I’ve done.” 

“So?!” protests Herb. “Do you think that if you just do enough shitty things then they’ll all cancel each other out and you never have to feel guilty about any of them?”

“I can’t feel guilty about _everything!_ I can’t just go around every day of my life thinking about how I traumatised Penny and tried to fight you when I was high and sabotaged Todd’s rock opera that one time, constantly! That would _kill_ me. You _know_ that.”

Herb sighs. “I know. I’m sorry for yelling.” He sits down on the couch. “God, I feel awful.”

“Me too,” mutters BoJack. “I need a drink.” 

Herb stiffens. “Don’t you _dare.”_

“I won’t,” BoJack assures him. “...I want to, though.”

“...I know the feeling,” murmurs Herb.

* * *

It’s a little before six in the morning when he wakes up.

The sleep pattern is one of the parts of sobriety that’s hardest to get used to. He can’t just take a concerningly large amount of alcohol and/or horse tranquilisers and pass out, he has to have an actual sleep _schedule,_ one that involves going to bed at some point in the evening and waking up approximately eight to ten hours later in the morning. It’s something he’s still not used to, and he’s still a little prone to waking up at ungodly hours.

He wakes up. He sleepily checks his phone -- it’s almost six, but his half-asleep brain only reads the first number, and incorrectly tells him that it’s five in the morning and there’s no need whatsoever for him to be awake. He turns over and tries to go back to sleep, because he had that _goddamn_ dream again, the one with the dinner party, and he _always_ wakes up before he can see how it ends, and he _knows_ that it’s probably not going to have some magical satisfying ending where he gets closure with his dead mom and his uncle he never met, but he has to _try._

He rolls over, and realises he has _far_ too much space.

The recurring dream about the dinner party is forgotten, and his eyes shoot open. The bed is empty.

He grabs his phone and gets out of bed. He’s still half-asleep, and it’s all still groggy, but he stumbles out of the room. Normally he would need coffee to even be semi-functional this early in the morning, but he skips it in his hurry. When he steps outside, his body practically produces his own caffeine. “Herb!” 

Herb turns to face him, and takes a few steps away from the pool. “What are you doing up?”

“I woke up in the night and you weren’t there. What are _you_ doing up?”

“...Couldn’t sleep.”

BoJack hesitates, then decides to bite the bullet and ask. “Were you thinking of jumping?”

“...” Herb gulps. “I don’t think I would have done it. Not yet.”

“But were you thinking about it?”

Herb hangs his head, and remains silent.

“Oh my God, Herb, come here.”

Herb, however reluctantly, backs further away from the pool until he’s close enough to grab BoJack’s hand. “I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“...I don’t know.” He sighs. “Hey, BJ, would you be okay without me for a couple days?”

“Uh, yeah,” mutters BoJack, taken aback. “Would you? I don’t know if this is a good time for a vacation.”

“...” Herb is quiet for a long time. “I feel like I’m a danger to myself. I think I need to go to the hospital.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Shit, are you sure?”

“I’m never sure anymore.” He forces a small laugh. “But, yeah, I think I need to do this.”

“O-Okay,” says BoJack, audibly stunned. “Do you want help packing? Shit, what do you even _pack_ for something like that?”

“I don’t know. We’ll figure it out.” He sighs. “You’ll stay sober while I’m gone, right?”

“...Of course I will.”

* * *

He receives a call from an unknown number. 

He probably shouldn’t answer. Unknown numbers very rarely bring good news. But there’s a chance that it’s Herb, calling from some phone booth, asking to be picked up. So he answers.

That’s how he ends up in the house of Angela Diaz.

* * *

_“Now boys and girls, if you wanna do the BoJack_

_Take your hands and put them on your lower back_

_Take your circle and strut and strut_

_Wriggle your hips and jiggle your -- uh-oh!”_

He barely manages to do the dance and slur the lyrics. He’s not _drunk,_ no, that would be a _relapse_ and relapses are _bad._ It was just _one_ drink, followed by another drink, followed by several more. Just to be polite. Angela’s an old friend.

...Well, Angela’s an old acquaintance.

Angela sighs fondly. “You’re not a bad comedian, you know.”

“Yeah…” he slurs.

“Nobody wants to _do the BoJack_ now, though.” She frowns. “Herb’s being gay and controversial _again_ and you’re being tainted by association.”

BoJack waits a long time for this to sink in, which takes a while, thanks to the drinks. “Tainted?”

“I should have called your bluff, back in the 90s,” she murmurs, more to herself than him. “When you said you would walk if he was fired. I should have called your bluff.”

BoJack frowns. “I wasn’t bluffing.”

“Pfft, as if,” she scoffs, waving a hand dismissively. “I mean, _sure,_ it was a nice thing to do as his ‘friend’, but you would have abandoned ship the _second_ it seemed like we were serious.”

“No,” insists BoJack. “I-I wouldn’t have. I was really going to quit for him, I … I’d rather ruin the show than do it without him.”

Angela raises an eyebrow at him. “Why?” she questions. “If you had ruined your career for him, you would have wasted your whole life on stupid commercials and amateur stand-up. Now you’re rich and famous and loved, and you’d give that all up for Herb?”

BoJack scoffs. “I’d give it all up for half a tub of ice cream and an old sock. Being rich and famous _never_ made me happy.”

“Then what would?”

BoJack’s face falls. “I don’t know.”

Angela sighs, turning away from him. “You could have abandoned him, you know. I don’t think it would have changed anything.”

“Of course it would,” slurs BoJack, but he barely believes it himself.

“What could it change?” She makes eye contact with him. “With everything you’ve done, abandoning your ‘best friend’ when he needed you most would be a drop in the bucket. What in your life could be worsened by his absence at this point?”

BoJack stands up. “What are you trying to say?”

“That it doesn’t _matter_ whether or not you helped Herb in the 90s, because if you’d abandoned him, that wouldn’t have been the problem. _Nothing_ you’ve done could ever be the problem, because _you’re_ the problem.” She sighs. “The way I see it, life is like a puzzle. People fit together, and they can make something meaningful. But some people are just born broken. Some people are pieces that don’t quite fit.”

BoJack remains silent.

“What do you do with a puzzle piece that shouldn’t be there? One that doesn’t quite fit with the other pieces, and that isn’t necessary to create a bigger picture?”

BoJack isn’t sure what to say. It’s been a while since he’s completed a jigsaw puzzle.

“Simple,” continues Angela. “You get rid of it.”

BoJack stares blankly at Angela for a long time. Finally, he gulps down a final swig of alcohol, and without bothering to ask for permission, grabs her car keys from the table. “You’re right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woohoo home stretch babey! weve got 2 chapters left, and ive got them pretty well planned out. 
> 
> real talk doing the AU version of the Angela scene was interesting since that was actually the scene that inspired this entire fic. basically in canon, after angela admits she was bluffing, bojack gets angry and says something along the lines of "this was all your fault! every shitty thing i ever did, that started when i betrayed herb!" and Angela kinda dismisses him, saying that it doesn't matter if doing that one thing differently would have changed everything, because he didnt do it differently and now he's who he is. 
> 
> and i was sorta like "hmm ... *would* everything have gone differently if he hadn't betrayed Herb? or was he already on the path to darkness by the time Herb was outed and saving him at that point would just be too little too late?"
> 
> ironically, this fic that was written entirely to answer that question hasn't really had a concrete answer yet, or even really addressed what parts are different to canon other than a brief line from Hollyhock in the chapter based on Ancient History. the last 2 chapters are going to do a better job at analysing that. hopefully


	25. Too Little, Too Late

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> BoJack goes to a dinner party with some family and old friends.

He nudges his food.

“I don’t know if I have a ‘worst part’,” he murmurs uneasily. “I’ve had a lot of what I thought were rock bottoms only to find a deeper, rockier bottom underneath.” He grips the table to steady himself against the rapid spinning of the room. “Best part was easily when Herb was cancer-free, though.”

The voice that responds to him is a feminine one, mocking and cynical like always. “Oh yes, that  _ really  _ seemed like the best part. Didn’t you break down crying because you were sure you would  _ never  _ be really happy?”

Beatrice tilts slightly, as does the rest of the room, and BoJack forces himself to stay upright. “Well, maybe you should have done a better job at raising me if you didn’t want me to be a goddamned wreck that’s incapable of happiness.”

“I should have raised you better?!” chokes Beatrice incredulously. “You  _ ruined  _ my life. You forced me to marry that  _ idiot,  _ you ruined my body, you --”

The one unfamiliar face at the table -- the uncle he never met and yet could never live up to -- clears his throat loudly. “Okay, my turn. My best part was when I signed to enlist.”

Beatrice turns to BoJack. “Are you ready to sing The Lollypop Song in the big show later?”

“No, mom,” answers BoJack irritably. “You know I never make it to the show.”

“I didn’t know then,” continues Crackerjack. “That enlisting would lead to my two worst parts.”

Corduroy Jackson-Jackson’s eyes widen. “You have two? I didn’t know you could pick two.”

BoJack groans. “Corduroy, it’s a conversation, not an assignment.”

“In that case, I have three.”

“Oh,  _ come  _ on, three is  _ way  _ too many.”

Crackerjack clears his throat. “My worst parts were saying goodbye to my mother and seeing a bullet go straight through my general’s face, right before it hit my own.” He moves his bangs out of the way to present the large bullet scar in his forehead, prompting a room full of gasps.

“At least your death was instantaneous,” says Beatrice callously. “I still remember how  _ dizzy  _ I was when I was dying of old age.”

BoJack remembers too. He can feel the steady wavering of the room around him, and it’s disorienting, and he has to keep at least one hand gripping the table at all times to steady himself. Each passing moment has him more convinced that he’s an exaggerated hand gesture away from falling out of his chair. He tries to have a sip of the red wine that Zach Braff gave him, but he can only gulp down a sip before he spits it out. “Anyone else’s drink taste like… metal?!”

“Crackerjack,” asks Corduroy. “do you think your death meant something because it was in the service of a greater cause?”

“Aw, shucks,” mutters Crackerjack.

Beatrice gives an annoyed sigh. “Of  _ course  _ it meant something.”

Crackerjack chuckles nervously. “I think questions like that are too big for a little soldier like me.”

“My brother gave the  _ ultimate  _ sacrifice.”

“But see,” interrupts BoJack. “this is where I get hung up, because when we valorize the idea of sacrifice -- of loss, of suffering--”

“BoJack,” warns Beatrice. “don't start with this again.”

He ignores her. “When we grow up in a house that does that, we internalize this idea that being happy is a selfish act, but sacrifice doesn't mean anything.”

“Of  _ course  _ it does.”

“Sacrifice? In the service of something greater, maybe, but just in and of itself? What's the good in that?”

Beatrice clears her throat to indicate that this petty debate on the value of sacrifice is over and sighs. “When is our  _ esteemed guest  _ coming, anyway?”

“Yeah,” agrees BoJack. “Who even  _ is  _ he? You always talk about the  _ special guest  _ and then I always wake up before he arrives.”

Beatrice looks at him as though he’s an idiot, not that BoJack notices, because it’s rare for her to look at him any other way. “It’s Secretariat.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “Shit, really?”

“Of  _ course,”  _ says Beatrice, with admiration for the hero that she would have never dared express in life. “Although, for the world’s  _ fastest runner,  _ he always seems to be running terribly late. Speak of the devil.”

The door begins to creak open with a sound that could have been taken straight from a horror movie. The Secretariat that enters is not the reddish stallion that BoJack looked forward to. He’s tall and grey and menacing, and there’s a white stripe on his face and a pink spot on his muzzle. When he greets them all with a “Okay, okay, I’m sorry for being late”, he speaks with Secretariat’s voice, but BoJack can’t help but recognize him as Butterscotch Horseman.

“Did I miss the show?”

“Dad?” mumbles BoJack uncertainly.

“Oh,” says Beatrice venomously. “You didn’t miss a thing. It's not like we have anywhere to be. Why shouldn't we all bend ourselves to your schedule?” 

“I already apologized,” says Secretariat defensively. “I was running.”

“Yes. As always, running late, while I was running myself ragged trying to get dinner on the table.”

“And now I'm running out of patience for you running your mouth.” 

“And I'm running out the clock until we both … Well. Here we are.”

“What'd I miss?” asks Butterscotch. - 

“We're playing Best Part/Worst Part,” explains Corduroy.

“Okay, I got one.” He slams his hands down on the table as he takes a seat. “August 22nd, 1973, I was banned from running ever again. And running, well, that was the only thing that ever made sense to me, so if I couldn't do that I was nobody.”

BoJack takes another sip of his wine, but he can’t get past the metallic taste. He waves over to Zach Braff, but he’s busy getting Butterscotch’s food.

“This is your worst part?” asks Beatrice with a raised eyebrow. 

“Best part: jumping off that bridge.”

“Jesus,” mutters BoJack.

“I won’t have that religious talk in my house,” snaps Beatrice.

“It was my choice,” continues Secretariat. “I got to go on my own terms. Not a lot of people can say that.”

“No,” mumbles BoJack uncertainly. “That's true.”

“The view from up there…” He sighs fondly. “Eh, you wouldn't believe it.”

BoJack stands up so he can pour out his wine, but the second he dares release his grip on the table, the room tilts sideways and he somehow ends up on the floor. The room laughs. He manages to get back to his feet by using the table to pull himself up. “God, I’m so dizzy.”

“You’re concussed,” says Beatrice. “Quit your whining.”

“Oh,” asks Butterscotch. “You got a concussion?”

“Yeah. I, um…” He clears his throat. “How did I get a concussion?”

“Don't think about that.”

Beatrice stands up. “Well, are we ready to start the show?”

Corduroy practically leaps out of his seat. “Let’s do this!”

BoJack rolls his eyes. “Okay, nice seeing you all.”

“You’re not coming?” asks Secretariat.

“This is always the part where I wake up,” explains BoJack. “You all go to the show. Zach Braff says ‘Pardon my reach’ even though he can  _ clearly  _ get my plate from another angle. Then I wake up.”

“Oh, okay. Next time then.”

BoJack sighs, trying to fight the overwhelming dizziness that consumes him.

“Pardon my reach,” says Zach Braff, even though he can  _ clearly  _ get his plate from another angle.

Everyone exits the room, and nothing happens.

BoJack frowns.

* * *

The first performance is a bizarre show of auto-erotic asphyxiation by Corduroy Jackson-Jackson. When Zach Braff’s show begins, Butterscotch taps BoJack on the shoulder. “You wanna grab a smoke?”

BoJack sighs in relief. “Yeah, let's get out of here.” He pauses. “Where’s outside?”

Butterscotch leads him out to a grassy field, with a tree in the middle. The tree has large, protruding roots that threaten to trip Butterscotch, though BoJack navigates the with ease. Butterscotch lights two cigarettes and hands one to BoJack.

“So,” mutters BoJack anxiously. “That door that Corduroy went through... what's on the other side?”

Butterscotch ignores this. “This is where I tripped.”

“Huh?”

“During the duel.”

BoJack’s blood runs cold. “So you are Butterscotch? Because everyone calls you Secretariat, and you’re wearing a tank top and shorts, and my dad would  _ never  _ wear that…”

“Yeah. Wouldn’t want to be caught wearing such informal clothing to  _ nowhere,  _ at this time of the  _ nothing.”  _ He forces a laugh. “I gotta tell you something, BJ.”

BoJack cringes. “Nobody calls me BJ. Nobody except …”

“Yeah, well, you abandoned him, so what does that matter now?” He sighs. “I know this part is confusing, because I'm Secretariat and also your dad for some reason, but speaking as Secretariat, it's important that you know that you made a mistake.”

BoJack scoffs. “Oh, I made plenty.”

Secretariat frowns. “No, I mean you made a mistake in coming here.” He sigh. “It's good at first, getting to leave on your own terms. But once you see the view from halfway down…”

There's a long, painful silence.

“You know,” says BoJack hopefully. “If my dad wanted to say something… if he wanted to say that he really did love me, and he's sorry for all the times he used to yell at me and hit me and remind me how worthless I am…” He gulps. “This would be the time to do it.”

Butterscotch exhales a wisp of smoke. “That's true. There's no time like the present.”

BoJack’s eyes light up.

“...And this is neither no time, nor the present.”

BoJack’s face falls. “Are you sure? There's  _ nothing  _ you want to say to me before I wake up?”

Butterscotch chuckled. “Wake up? Oh, you're not getting it, are you?”

He gestures toward wall near the tree, one that BoJack didn't see before. It's a simple brick wall, but there's tire tracks leading up to it and smoke pouring out of a cracked portion. The cause of the damage is clear: roughly slammed into the wall, with cracked windows and a ruined engine and blood visible on the seats inside, is the smashed remains of a yellow Tesla.

* * *

He gulps. “I can’t be here.”

“Of course,” snarls Beatrice. “Everything’s always about you.” 

He turns to Butterscotch. “How did I get here?”

“How the hell would I know?”

“I…” He struggles to remember as his breathing quickens. “I went to Angela Diaz’s house. She said she should have called my bluff, but I wasn’t bluffing, I … I drank a lot, and then I went for a drive -- no, no, no, no, wait, wait, wait, I pulled over!” His eyes light up. “And then I called Herb.”

“BoJack,” murmurs Crackerjack uneasily. “We’re trying to do a show here…”

“But I called Herb!” protests BoJack. “I can’t have crashed if I pulled over to call Herb. So, I shouldn’t be here, I, I, I --- If I could just finish the conversation … where’s a phone?”

“Oh, for  _ God’s  _ sake!” snaps Butterscotch, standing over BoJack, getting uncomfortably close. “Flying off the handle won’t change a  _ thing.  _ This was  _ bound  _ to happen to you one of these days, you fat piece of shit!” He groans. “Look, I have to go, okay? My act’s coming up and I have to prepare the ropes backstage.” 

He walks off. Beatrice and Crackerjack step up to the stage. BoJack is left alone, trembling in a seat in the audience.

Beatrice and Crackerjack perform together. Crackerjack stands behind a floating podium, playing a trumpet rendition of that song Beatrice likes, and Beatrice does an elaborate ribbon dance in the air, but the ribbon is pure black, and it comes from  _ that door.  _ Eventually Crackerjack ties the ribbon around himself and jumps into  _ the door,  _ and the ribbon spirals out and expands until it drags Beatrice down too.

There’s a long, painful silence.

The door closes. Secretariat comes out from behind the curtain and moves to the front of the stage. “I, uh, I have a poem to present. Original, obviously. It’s called ‘Too Little, Too Late’.”

He clears his throat.

_ “The weak breeze whispers nothing, _

_ The water screams sublime _

_ Feet shift, teeter-totter _

_ Deep breath, stand back, it’s time.” _

The door seems to move a little closer.

_ “The flailing is too little, _

_ The regret comes too late _

_ You see the view from halfway down _

_ You know you’ve sealed your fate.” _

The door moves closer. Secretariat swallows a lump in his throat.

_ “He can’t be your lifeguard _

_ When you know you want to drown _

_ He’ll try to pull you up  _

_ And you’ll just drag him halfway down.” _

BoJack gulps. The door moves closer.

_ “You can try to save him now _

_ Or you can make him wait _

_ No matter what you do now _

_ It’s just too little, too late.” _

The door is a little over halfway between its starting point and its goal, the horse. There are small beads of sweat appearing on his face.

_ “A little wind, a summer sun, _

_ A river, rich and regal, _

_ A flood of fond endorphins  _

_ Brings a calm that knows no equal.” _

The door is closer now. If it were a person, it would be uncomfortably breathing down his neck. “Hold on, hold on, I’m not done.” He clears his throat.

_ “He tried so hard to save you _

_ But you know you’d sealed your fate _

_ By the time you married _

_ It was too little, too late.” _

The door is so close, it threatens to swallow him. Sweat pours down his face and mingles with his fur.

_ “You should have known back then _

_ That it was too little, too late.” _

He gulps.

_ “Don’t bother waking up. _

_ It’d just be too little, too late.” _

He looks like he’s done. He stops edging forward to escape the door’s wrath. He takes a step backward, prepared to gracefully fall into the door just like Crackerjack did, to accept his fate in death just as Secretariat did in life. But as he steps backward, the door escapes him just like he tried to escape it. It moves away.

Butterscotch clears his throat.

_ “You loved Herb, but count the cost.” _

He takes another step toward the door. It stays still. 

_ “The humans were saved…” _

He’s right in front of the door now. He’s ready to step into it. There’s a strange creaking noise, and the bottoms of a pair of white sneakers seem to be hanging from the ceiling, attached to some rope hidden by the curtain.

_ “...but the horse was lost.” _

He steps into the blackness. The door slams shut behind him, hard, and it seems to send a vibration through the whole room. As if somehow triggered by the door’s slam, the white sneakers suddenly begin a rapid descent, and the body attached to them is visible, hanging from the ceiling by a long, thick rope.

BoJack gasps for a full breath of air. He had been afraid of Secretariat’s performance -- afraid that after the departure of Corduroy, Zach, Beatrice, Crackerjack, and then Butterscotch, he would be left alone in the house. What would he even  _ do  _ alone? Pace around until he woke up? Would he wake up?

But, despite the thick rope around her neck, the body has open eyes that scan the room and linger on him in ways that no corpse could do. He’s not alone. 

God knows he wishes he was.

Knowing that she’s dead is a different matter to seeing her dead, and seeing her body is a different matter entirely to seeing her hanging from the ceiling in some strange dying dream version of purgatory. The sight makes his breathing grow fast, and tears threaten to leak from his eyes. When he tries to reach out to her, to say her name, it comes out as a strangled cry:

_ “...Hollyhock…” _

Hollyhock descends to the stage and removes her neck from the noose. “Hey,” she mutters nervously.

“Oh my God,” he breathes out. “I -- I don’t understand -- why would you -- ?”

“I explained in the note,” she answers irritably. 

“Hollyhock, I’m so sorry for everything that happened with you. With us. I should have protected you --”

“Little late now, huh?” She forces a laugh. 

He stands up. “I can’t be here. I have to go.”

“Hey, throwing a tantrum isn’t going to pull your body out of that car, so you might as well just sit down.”

BoJack, trembling, sits back down.

“Look, BoJack,” she mutters. “It’s possible that someone is going to find you and save you, and it’s also possible that someone won’t. You can’t know that.”

BoJack gulps. “Has anyone ever come back from this place?”

“There is no ‘place’. It’s just your brain going through what it thinks it has to go through.” She sighs. “All you can do right now is sit back and enjoy the show.”

“...” He takes a long, shaky breath. “Okay.”

“Good.” She picks up a brown, unpainted acoustic guitar from a corner of the room. He didn’t even know she could play. A small stool appears for her to sit on, and she strums a few chords, to check that it’s tuned. Satisfied with the intonation of her instrument, she starts singing.

_ “Life is a never-ending show, big bro, _

_ Except the minor detail that it ends _

_ There’s nothing left, so sit back and enjoy the show _

_ Here with all your family and friends!” _

She gestures to the empty room. It feels like there should be more people there. It feels like the emotional equivalent of walking outside a large primary school on a weekday at three PM to find that there are no parents outside and no children exiting, so you check your phone to figure out what public holiday it is, and you can’t think of any reason for the school to be empty.

_ “You love your friends, you play your part, _

_ It always ends just like it starts, _

_ You fall, you crash, you cry, and you call! _

_ And don’t stop dancin’, _

_ Don’t stop dancin’ ‘till the curtains fall!” _

She rapidly strums an instrumental break, and BoJack’s face falls as he watches her fingering. This isn’t just the basic, easy chords that he learned before he got bored with guitar, this is genuinely impressive, complex playing. He didn’t even know she could play.  _ Can  _ she play? Is this really her, or just a manifestation his mind created in an attempt to get closure with his half-sister?

_ “We’re all just rotten little cogs, mon frere, _

_ Spun by forces out of our control _

_ Life is just a bitter nasty slog, I swear, _

_ No wonder that living takes its toll!” _

She strums one final chord. When the guitar is dropped to the floor, it doesn’t make a noise. You could hear a pin drop as she starts singing again, slower and unaccompanied, into the silence.

_ “The body’s found, _

_ The mourning starts, _

_ A flatline sounds, _

_ And that’s your heart, _

_ You’ve really gone and ruined it all… _

_ Don’t stop dancing, _

_ Don’t stop dancing, _

_ Don’t stop dancing…” _

She steps off the stool, and toward the door. BoJack leaps out of his seat, clambering onto the stage and grabbing her arm before she can leave. “Wait.”

She looks at him expectantly.

“You can’t go.”

“Of course I can,” she mutters, trying to pull away. “I have to. So do you, eventually.”

“Not yet,” he insists, pulling her away from the door. “I -- Maybe you’re already gone, maybe there’s nothing I can do to save you now. But I’m not meant to be here! I -- I didn’t crash the car, I called Herb!”

There’s a long painful silence.

“BoJack,” says Hollyhock gently. “They don’t let you bring phones into the psychiatric ward.”

His eyes widen. His face falls. “He didn’t pick up.”

“Right.”

“It went to voicemail.”

“Yeah.”

“And then I started driving again.”

He gulps. 

“It’s too late, BoJack. What’s done is done.”

“No,” he insists, backing away. “I-- I’m not going through that door. I’m not giving up.”

Hollyhock sighs and places a hand on his shoulder. “The door isn’t giving up, BoJack, and the door isn’t fighting, either. The door’s just a door.”

“...Where does it go?”

“Nowhere.”

His eyes widen. He stares at the door as though it will swallow him in the time it takes to blink. “H-How do I stay alive?” he asks, with a pleading tone in his voice. “If I stay out here instead of going through the door, will that make me stay alive in the real world?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. I think it’s just … a door.”

She breaks free from his grasp and steps toward the door.

“Wait!” he calls. “Can we just … stay a little longer?”

She shakes her head. “You can, I guess. But where do you draw the line?”

She walks into the abyss, and BoJack is left alone. There’s a long, painful silence. Her words echo in his mind.

_ Where do you draw the line? _

He makes a beeline for the door. A flatline sounds, and his lifeline becomes a punchline.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I gotta say, replacing the drowning with a car crash was one of those things where every time I hinted toward it I was thinking "jesus this is so obvious, someones definitely going to point this out in the comments, this wont even be a plot twist" so im kinda impressed that nobody theorised about it until this chapter was released! for those who are curious, here's a brief summary of all the foreshadowing toward it:  
> -"Chekhov's Gun" (chapter 4) has a bunch of references to car crashes, which I pretty much explicitly said was foreshadowing. at the time yall assumed it was a reference to herb dying but most of the car crash references were based on canon drowning references  
> -"Escape to L.A." (chapter 6). shouldn't have to explain this one  
> -"What Else Is There To Say?" (chapter 9) has the scene with BJ telling Ana how shit he feels after seeing the Oscar nominations replaced with him talking to Herb, and him telling Ana he feels like he's drowning is replaced with him telling Herb he feels like he's crashing. later in the chapter a scene where he drives into the pool is replaced by him just driving into a wall.  
> -"That's Enough, Man!" (chapter 11) has his canonical suicide attempt by car crash replaced by an attempt by drowning (because like I guess this is a weird role swap AU of drowning and car crashes)  
> -"Fat Piece of Shit" (chapter 14) has a brief line coming from BJ's self-hating thoughts about how he should "do everyone a favour" and drive into his pool. this is based on a canon line saying that he should swerve into traffic  
> -Chapter 18 ("Bad Time") has the scene of him deliberately crashing his car replaced by him deliberately slipping on water


	26. Too Much, Too Soon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wedding brings people together.

A lifeline sounds, and his flatline becomes a punchline.

**“I told you that I love you.”**

In his semi-conscious state, he can hear the footsteps, hear the mush of sound that denotes concerned friends even if he can’t tell exactly what they’re saying. 

“He’s showing signs of recovery.”

“Hooray!”

“I … I can’t stay here. Keep me posted, okay?”

_ “I know this part is confusing, because I’m Secretariat and also your dad for some reason, but speaking as Secretariat, it’s important you know that you made a mistake.” _

“Oh, fish, I have to go. Judah needs help with preparations.”

“But if you go now, you might not be here when he --”

“None of us are gonna be here when he wakes up. The nurses will kick us all out to check his vitals or something.”

“Do you think he can hear us? Like, in his dreams?”

_ “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I think it’s just … a door.” _

“I bet he’s dreaming of a crossover episode!”

“He is  _ not  _ dreaming about a crossover episode.”

“What would he dream about, then?”

“I don’t know. Same thing anyone dreams about. A series of surreal events with little to no continuity between them and little to no connection to reality.”

“It has to mean something.”

“Does anything really have to mean anything?”

“He’s getting better. It’s likely he’s going to wake up soon.”

His blurry vision manages to barely make out a nurse checking his vitals. He drifts in and out of consciousness for several days. 

**“...Please believe me.”**

_ Where do you draw the line? _

* * *

“And  _ you,” _ she says, rather politely. “Are a complete  _ dick  _ sucked by a dumb shit.”

“I feel like that catchphrase made more sense before you got sober.”

He groans emphatically and blinks several times in an attempt to clear his blurry vision. “God. What happened?”

“Uh,” Sarah mutters, running a hand through the shaved portion of her hair. “Basically, your sister died, you got  _ super  _ drunk with Angela Diaz, and then you crashed your car into a building. Got a concussion, and, uh, I think you cut yourself on something in the impact?” She shrugs. “The doctors said you lost a lot of blood. Might have been internal though.”

“Jesus.” He attempts to sit up and discovers that he can’t. “How long have I been out for?”

“Around a year.”

“Holy shit.” His eyes widen. “Is, uh, is Herb okay?”

If she grimaces for a moment, then BoJack isn’t awake enough to see it. “Yeah, he’s … he’s fine. Been  _ really  _ worried about you, though. He’ll, uh, he’ll probably come visit when he gets the chance.”

“That’s good.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“While we’re here,” says Sarah. “I just wanted to thank you. For saving me at the planetarium.”

“I did what anyone else would have done,” he mutters, somewhat defensively.

“Yeah, but it saved my life. In, uh… In more ways than one.” She sighs. “I don’t think I thanked you enough for that.”

“You’re welcome.”

A nurse shoos her out to check his vitals, and he drifts in and out of consciousness as he waits to be discharged.

* * *

The second he’s allowed out of the hospital, with strict instructions about not drinking or consuming drugs and not overexerting himself, he almost gets knocked over by a dog.

“Woah!” he gasps, using a nearby pole to steady himself. “Dude, what the hell?”

“Sorry,” mutters Mr. Peanutbutter. “I just got so  _ excited  _ to see you again.” He glances BoJack’s outfit down. “Were you planning on wearing that? Really leaning on that  _ optional  _ in black tie optional.”

“What are you talking about?”

Mr. Peanutbutter’s eyes widen. “Oh my God, you don’t know!” He starts dragging BoJack toward his car. “Princess Carolyn and Judah are getting married, and they told me if you woke up in time then I  _ had  _ to take you to the wedding.”

“Oh, okay. When is it?”

Mr. Peanutbutter glances at his watch. “Uh, we’ve got, like, two hours.”

“Holy shit.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll get you a suit.” He pauses. “And I  _ might  _ have to do a  _ bit  _ of a press thing on the way. Gotta help repair the Ollywoo sign.”

* * *

Some time later, after Mr. Peanutbutter rambles into the phone about how he’s  _ strongly  _ considering using another company the next time he needs a sign, they drive through the streets of Dollywooh and pull up at the beach where the wedding is held. A convenient distraction by Erica leaves BoJack alone, staring at the crowds. 

He searches for a familiar face, but he can’t recognize anyone except Mr. Peanutbutter, and he’s busy with Erica. He frowns. Where’s Princess Carolyn? And his friends? And … ?

“BoJack! Thank God I found you!” 

“What?” he stutters.

He finds himself staring down at Todd. “The fireworks are going to start in ten minutes. There's no time to explain. We need to go down to the beach so I can sit on your shoulders!”

“What? Why?”

“I just said there's no time to explain! Did you get into that car crash by being a bad listener? Come on, we gotta go!”

BoJack sighs. “Okay.”

* * *

A 3D firework representation of Judah explodes overhead and BoJack frowns. “So why did we need to be on the beach?”

“Oh, you just seemed really overwhelmed at the party. I thought you could use some air.”

“Oh. Thanks.” He pauses. “But then why are you on my shoulders?”

“So I could get a better view of the fireworks.”

BoJack groans. “Okay, get down.”

“Oh, okay.” Todd clambers off of his back. “It's good to see you. Sucks that you relapsed and almost died.”   
“Well,” mutters BoJack, somewhat defensively.  _ “Technically  _ I’ve been sober for the past year.” His eyes widen. “Wait, that means that in a couple months, I'll beat my record for being sober.”

“Nice!”

“Yeah, so that's that's something to aim for, but then, uh, after that, um..” 

“After that,” interrupts Todd. “you'll beat your record again. Every day, you'll set a new record.”

“Sure.” He frowns. “But it didn’t count if I was in a coma. I didn’t have to make any choices for myself. I worry about what's gonna happen now that I’m awake. What if I relapse again?”

“Then you'll get sober again.” Todd puts a hand on his shoulder. “Let me tell you something. I was at the office the other day, doing the  _ Hokey Pokey _ with some work associates, and I realized everyone misunderstands that song.”

BoJack raises an eyebrow. “The  _ Hokey Pokey?” _

“Yeah, there's way too much emphasis on the hokey pokey part.”

“That  _ is  _ what it's all about.”

“No,” protests Todd. “That's exactly what I mean. That's not what the song is saying.”

“...Okay.”

“And I was thinking about my mom, you know, my relationship with my mom.” He sighs. “It's weird. You know, awkward. I feel like she doesn't really get me, but, you know, she's trying. And a couple years ago, I never thought I would have any kind of relationship with her. Like, I was sure of it.”

“What changed?” asks BoJack. 

“I don't know. I did? Or Or she did? Or, um, we are?” He sighs. “So, that's what I'm talking about. It's like the song says. ‘You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around.’ You  _ turn yourself around. That's  _ what it's all about.”

“Yeah,” mutters BoJack. “I don't know if the songwriters put that much thought into the existential significance of the lyrics. They literally rhyme ‘about’ with ‘about’.”

“But isn't the point of art less what people put into it and more what people get out of it?”

BoJack chuckles. “You sound like Herb.” He frowns. “Where  _ is  _ Herb? I haven’t seen him since…” He gestures vaguely. “...You know…”

“I’m not sure,” admits Todd. “He said he’d be here, but I haven’t seen him yet.” He sighs. “He, uh. He hasn’t exactly had a great year.”

“Really?” snarks BoJack. “Was it because his husband was in a coma? Or just the weather?”

“Actually, I think it was a lot of stuff,” says Todd, avoiding eye contact. “I didn’t really expect him to come. He’s been too anxious for parties lately.”

“Oh.” BoJack’s face falls. “But he knows I’m here, doesn’t he? And that I’m awake?”

“Mr. Peanutbutter told basically everyone you know in a mass text,” explains Todd. “And Herb hasn’t let his phone leave his sight since you crashed, so he probably knows. Still,” he adds, smiling. “Maybe he’s waiting at home for you. I mean, having to talk to you for the first time in a year  _ and  _ go to a party seems like a lot. Maybe doing both at once would just be too much, too soon.”

“Hmm,” repeats BoJack thoughtfully. “Too much, too soon.”

* * *

After a quick dance with Princess Carolyn, “for old time’s sake”, he goes up to the roof. “Thought I might find you here.”

Diane guiltily snubs out her cigarette on the roof tile. “I’m trying to quit.”

“Yeah,” he snarks. “You look like you’re trying really hard.”

“Don’t be shitty,” she snaps, but it’s a playful snap; there’s no real malice in her voice. After a pause, she adds, “Sorry about your car accident.”

“I was really drunk,” mutters BoJack in answer as he sits down next to her. “And I  _ knew  _ I don’t exactly have a good history with alcohol, but I drank anyway. So I kinda made my own bed on that one.”

“Still, though. It sucks that that happened to you.”

“It does, yeah.” He shudders. “The part that really gets me is that I don’t remember it. Like, Sarah explained everything to me when I first woke up, and I have a vague memory of what happened leading up to the crash, but…”

She smirks. “You’d think  _ you  _ of all people would be used to not remembering what happened when you were drunk.”

“Yeah, you’d think. I’d been sober for a year when it happened, though. That might be part of it. What about you, what’s new with you?”

As answer, she presents her hand to him, showing off a golden ring on her wedding finger.

“Wow,” he mutters, stunned. “The same guy you moved to Chicago for?”

“Yeah,” she answers. “Although we moved to Houston a while back, around the time that you crashed.”

“Houston?” He can’t wipe the smirk off his face. “I can  _ not  _ picture you in Houston.”

“Neither could I, for a while, but Guy’s ex moved there and took his son with her, so we went too.” She glances up at the stars. “My book series is getting really popular.”

“The  _ Ivy Tran  _ series?” asks BoJack. “That was being advertised a lot even before I crashed.”

“Oh, it’s absolutely  _ soaring,”  _ she insists, blushing slightly. “I’m basically the next J.K. Rowling, except without all the tweets that ruin it. Oh, I just remembered, Herb wanted to talk to you.”

“Of  _ course  _ he wants to talk to me. Any idea where he is?”

“Not sure. I said hi to him when he first came, but I haven’t seen him since. Maybe you should go look for him.”

“Yeah, I guess I should.” He stands up, and then frowns. “Hey, Diane?”

She looks up at him. “Yeah?”

“Am I ever gonna see you again after today?”

Diane shrugs. “We live apart now. Todd told me he doesn’t think he wants to marry Maude even if they do live together and love each other, so I won’t have a reason to come back to L.A. for a while. I mean, we’ll call each other and stuff, but we might not meet up again in person for at least a few years.”

“Oh.” His face falls. “We won’t drift apart, will we?”

“I don’t know.” She smiles. “I don’t think we will. We didn’t when I was in Chicago, and we didn’t when you were in a coma. But if we do, I think I can live with it. If you exit my life now, that just means you were never meant to be in my life forever.”

“That’s a nice way of looking at it.” He sighs. “I’ve gotta go look for Herb. Try to say bye to me on your way out.”

“I will.”

* * *

He finds Herb, somehow, in the bathroom.

“Herb?” he says aloud, in shock. Herb freezes for a moment, then turns to face him with a shy wave.

“Uh, hi, BJ. Sorry, you kinda caught me off guard there.”

“What are you doing in the bathroom?”

“I don’t know,” mumbles Herb, gesturing vaguely. “What does anybody do in a bathroom?”

BoJack gives him a look.

He sighs in defeat. “Okay, I was hiding.”

“Hiding?” repeats BoJack, frowning. “From what?”

“I don’t know,” says Herb, avoiding eye contact. “Maybe Judah? Or Princess Carolyn? Maybe just the crowds. Or maybe…”

The sentence doesn’t need finishing.

“I love you,” says BoJack.

“I love you too.”

“And I think it should go without saying that I’m sorry.”

Herb frowns. “What should you be sorry for?”

“Uh, everything?” He raises an eyebrow. “I  _ told  _ you I would be fine if you left for a few days. You were going through a lot then, and you  _ needed  _ me to be able to help you. But instead I freaked out, relapsed, and almost died.” He stares at Herb. “Don’t you feel  _ anything  _ about that?”

“I never said I was happy about it,” snaps Herb. “I just don’t see the point in blaming you.”

BoJack is silent for a long time.

“There’s one thing I’m worried about,” he mutters.

Herb looks up. “What?”

“I… don’t really remember what happened,” he explains. “I know that I called you and it went to voicemail, and I think I left you a message, but I don’t know what the message said, and … I don’t know, I feel like it was something really awful.”

“Awful?” questions Herb, raising an eyebrow. “What do you think you said?”

“I don’t know. Something guilt-trippy. Like, I don’t know, ‘I’m going for a drive, because nothing matters and nobody cares about me. Call me back if you don’t want me to drive. Otherwise, I’m just gonna assume you don’t care.’”

Herb’s eyes widen. “No, nothing like that. It was, uh, actually kinda nice.” He forces a laugh. “I mean, it wasn’t because it took me hours to get in touch with anyone who knew anything and I was sure you were dead…” He shudders. “But the voicemail itself, it wasn’t too bad. You apologised for a lot of stuff, and said goodbye. You had this weird idea that it was for the best.”

“Geez,” mutters BoJack. “I’m sorry I put you through that.”

“You already apologised.” He sighs. “Nobody else knows it was an attempt. I mean, I told all your friends about what happened, but I let them think you were just drunk driving.”

BoJack’s eyes widen. “That’s a lot to be bottling up for a year.”

“Well, I didn’t completely bottle it up. My therapist knows.”

“That’s something, at least.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“So,” suggests BoJack hopefully. “How about we quickly say goodbye to Diane since she’s going to Houston, and then we go home, and just for a few hours, we can pretend none of this ever happened?”

Herb’s eyes widen. A smile crosses his face. “I’d like that.”

They take a few steps toward each other. Grinning widely, they pull each other into a tight embrace, one that they’ve both been wanting badly for the last year. For a moment, for one beautiful moment, there’s no wedding and no guests noticing their absence and no raw, unprocessed trauma. There’s just the two of them, hugging, in the bathroom.

The salty tears rather ruin it.

“Woah,” mutters BoJack, pulling away from Herb and trying to wipe the wet patch off of his shirt. “What’s wrong?”

“I thought you would stay sober,” sobs Herb, wiping his eyes. “You  _ told  _ me you would stay sober. When I got home and the car wasn’t in the driveway, I thought you were just at the shops or something, I was planning how I was going to surprise you when you got back, and then I checked my phone and I had this  _ voicemail.” _

“I’m sorry,” says BoJack uselessly.

“For hours, I was sure you were dead, and I was sure it was  _ my fault,  _ for trying to prioritise my own mental health  _ once.”  _ He sniffles. “You told me you would be okay without me for a few days, but I made you say that. Was I selfish for believing you?”

“No,” says BoJack hurriedly. “It was never your job to save me.”

“Then  _ why  _ did you always make me feel like it was?”

BoJack stares down at his shoes in shame. “I-I’m sorry. I don’t even know why I called you.”

“Yeah,” snaps Herb. “you do.”

There’s a long, ominous silence.

Herb takes in several deep breaths. “I -- I’m sorry. For snapping at you. I didn’t -- I didn’t realise I still had all those complicated feelings about the voicemail.” He sighs. “I’m glad you’re alive.”

“Me too,” says BoJack.

“Maybe…” He hesitates. “Maybe this is too much, too soon. Going home together and having our happily ever after, I mean. Maybe we need a break from each other. Or … maybe we’re just not right for each other anymore.”

BoJack’s face falls. “Come  _ on,  _ Herb.” He gulps. “I get that I hurt you, and I’m  _ so  _ sorry for that. And I think you might have a point about needing a break from each other. But if there’s one thing I learned in AA, it’s that relapses are part of recovery. And I  _ know  _ that things got out of hand when I went to Angela’s, but the fact that I got drunk then doesn’t mean I’m not committed to being sober, and I  _ promise  _ that if I relapse again, it won’t be as bad.”

Herb remains silent.

“Please,” continues BoJack. “We’ve had our ups and downs, but we’ve always worked things out. It’s not going to be easy, but we can make this work again if we put the effort in. We can keep fighting.”

“That’s true,” says Herb. “But how much effort do we have to put in? How long do we have to keep fighting?” He sighs. “Where do you draw the line?”

“...I don’t know,” admits BoJack. He looks at Herb with wide, pleading eyes.  _ “Please,  _ Herb. Just -- Keep going to therapy, and take care of yourself, and take a break from me if that’s what you need. But I don’t want to lose you forever. If you really love me, then  _ please,  _ stay with me.”

Herb takes a deep breath. “...BJ?”

“Yeah?”

“I told you that I love you.”

There’s a long, painful silence.

“Please believe me.”


End file.
